Found Out About You
by xXMethereaperXx
Summary: Mordecai held the keys to the truck everyone called Black Tear, knowing his life was about to change. Nothing mattered when he was behind the wheel. Not work, not life, not even backstabbing friends. If only he knew what lied in store for him the second he left his so called 'Best Friend' behind, realizing what a liar he was. Maybe he'll find what he wants on the road, miles away.
1. (P) Introduction to Destruction

Hello everyone.

I've had this idea for awhile but put it off thinking it was too average, but now it's haunting me and I've never been one to shy away from a challenge.

I couldn't of picked a worse time to begin it, either. This Indiana weather is going crazy, I haven't been able to keep my computer on more than an hour or two at a time because of how hot everything gets, so as with other stories I'm working on, most if not more of it will be typed on my phone and transferred when it cools down.

Length wise, it'll either be long or short depending on how much everyone likes it. I'll know by the second chapter.

Anyway, enough stalling, let's get on with the show.

* * *

"Come on, dude. Benson'll be back soon." Moredecai yelled, tossing a sponge at Rigby who was half asleep, leaning against the back tire of the park's truck.

Rigby mumbled, but stayed in his relaxed position.

"Rigby!" Mordecai yelled, "Get up! All I asked you to do were the wheels."

"Yeah, yeah," Rigby sighed while returning to work on the tires.

'This might just work,' he thought, stepping back to admire his progress.

The paint sparkled in the sunlight, reflecting the rays of the sun.

He looked down to the wheel Rigby "Completed" and shook his head, crouching to do it himself.

"These wheels look terrible."

When he didn't receive an answer, he looked over to see the sponge sitting in the dirt with no sign of Rigby.

"What?! Aww, he bailed on me!" he yelled looking around.

Following the sound of snoring, he found him asleep in the bed of the truck.

'I'm the one that should be sleeping,' he thought, washing the sponge in the nearby bucket, 'I've been working three days straight!'

He sighed. He'd been working a lot lately, but it was all part of his new plan to impress Margaret. Sure he'd made a lot of money, but that was only half of it. For the second part, he had to get on Benson's good side.

After finishing the wheels, he stood up and tossed the sponge into the bucket. Just in time too, he heard the quiet hum of the cart approaching.

Benson stopped near the truck and removed the key for the cart.

After inspecting Mordecai's work, he nodded, "Not bad, I didn't think it'd be done already."

"No prob."

Benson looked around, "Where's Rigby? I thought I told him to help."

"Uh, he ran off to put the soap and rags away," he lied, thinking quickly.

Benson and Mordecai both looked to where a rather loud bout of snoring erupted from the back of the truck.

Benson shook his head, "I can't say I'm surprised. You, however, I'm impressed with."

"Just trying to help,"

"You've done more than help," Benson said, giving the truck another look over, "You cut the entire park's grass, cleaned the fountain, and got those teenagers to stay out of the graveyard at night."

"Ha ha, nothing a few choice words couldn't fix," he answered, remembering how he'd spent the night hiding stereos tuned to the hip-hop station.

"Nonetheless, all he's done lately is sleep. You should find some better friends."

"Rigby's not so bad," he answered, trying to think of a reason to stick up for him.

"He's a bum," Benson said while checking his watch, "Well, I don't have anything else for you to do, so why don't you take an early day. You've earned it."

"Thanks."

Benson turned to leave.

'Step two,' Mordecai thought, "Uh, Benson, I was wondering if I could talk to you about something."

Benson stopped, "About what?"

"Well," he began, "Since the park has the new truck, would you consider letting me use the old truck?"

Benson turned around, a suspicious look on his face, "What old truck?"

"The one behind Skips' house. It was the park's old truck, right?"

Benson seemed to think for a moment, his eyes widening and a smile forming, "I had forgotten all about it!"

His smile slowly disappeared as he thought about Mordecai's request, "Let's go for a ride."

Mordecai gulped, "Should we wake up Rigby?"

Benson shook his head, "Leave him, maybe a sunburn will teach him to work instead of slack off."

**[][][]**

They came to a stop in front of Skips' garage which was open, showing his current project in pieces on a table.

Mordecai followed Benson out of the cart and to the front door. Benson hadn't said a single word on the drive over, leading him to think this was a bad idea.

Several moments after knocking, the door opened and Skips skipped outside, wiping his oil covered hands on a rag.

"Hey guys. Are you here for the leaf blower? I haven't finished it yet."

"No, Skips," Benson answered, his voice in the same tone as before, "We're here to see the Black Tear."

Skips thought for a moment, much the same way Benson did, "Black Te- Oh man, I'd forgotten all about it!"

"Black Tear?" Mordecai asked out of confusion.

They walked around to the back of the garage, fighting through the bushes and weeds that had grown around it.

"There she is," Skips said as they came to a stop in front of a large vehicle under a car cover.

"Ah, good times," Benson said as the smile found it's way back onto his face.

Skips pulled the cover off, exposing the old, battered vehicle beneath.

"Whoa,"

The truck's paint was badly faded from the sun before it was covered. The front end was damaged from an long ago accident, and the left headlight hung from it's bracket on the front end. At one point in time an aftermarket body kit was present, but the only remaining signs of it were the cracked and hanging side panel along with the remaining piece of front bumper.

The rear end faired better, the glass dust covered but still clear enough to see through. The back seat was folded down, the space filled with body panels and engine components. The front windshield was cracked, forming a web of lines across the driver side.

"What happened to it?" Mordecai asked, in shock of the condition of the beast before him.

Benson shook his head, "It was shortly after I started working here, Mr. Maellard asked me and Skips to buy a truck for the park. After looking for hours, we found this beauty on the way back to the park, abandoned in the woods. The keys were in it, and the title was taped to the window."

"We must have spent over a year building her, but she was the fastest car in the town! It seemed every payday we bought something new for it."

"How did it get like this?"

Benson sighed, "I was tricked into a race with someone and I couldn't handle it. Slid into a tree. If they wouldn't of cheated, I would of won."

"No way," Mordecai said while shaking his head, not believing uptight Benson was ever rebellious.

Benson pulled off his red cap, exposing a knick in his glass, "I'm lucky that's all that I got from it."

Skips hit a few of the panels on the truck, causing bits of rust to fall to the ground, "Well, it could be worse. What'd you need with it?"

Benson thought for a moment, his eyes tracing the outline of the vehicle, "Mordecai's gonna take it off our hands."

"What?" Skips and Mordecai asked in unison.

Benson nodded, "If he wants to pay to fix it and do the work, he can use it. However, you will need to get your license and pay for insurance."

Mordecai nodded happily, surprised it was that easy, "Whatever it takes."

Benson nodded, "All right. I'll find the keys when we get back to the house. Skips, see if you can move it out of here."

Skips cracked his knuckles and grinned, "Not a problem."

**[][][]**

Mordecai stepped out of the cart, "Thanks again, Benson."

Benson walked to the freshly washed truck, "No problem. You've shown me I can trust you, and I think you'll take good care of it."

Benson looked toward the house, "If you want to clean out the garage, you could bring it here."

Looking at the still asleep Rigby, Benson reached into the truck and hit the button for the horn.

"Rigby, wake up!"

The form of Rigby jumped up, "I'm awake! I was cleaning the back!"

"No, now you're raking all the leaves in the park!"

Rigby pointed at his watch, "But it's time for lunch!"

Benson sighed, "If you're gone more than an hour, you're fired! I better not see any leaves on the ground at the end of the day!"

"All right!"

Mordecai jumped into the driver seat of the cart while Rigby yawned and got in the passenger seat.

"Man, I can't believe we have to rake leaves now!"

Mordecai started driving in the direction of the town, "No, dude, you have to rake leaves. I got the rest of the day off."

"What?! How's that fair?!" Rigby yelled in disbelief.

"Because I've done nothing but work for the past days while all you did was sleep."

Rigby mumbled, "I get tired sometimes."

"Tell me about it," Mordecai began while stopping at a red light, "Where were you last night? I came in and you were gone."

"I was… playing video games with Thomas. We beat Matcless Mayhem."

Mordecai parked outside the diner and shook his head, "No way, dude. No one beats MM."

When they walked in Margaret was walking back toward the kitchen with a pot of coffee, "Hey guys! I'll be with you in a second."

"Dude, help me with the leaves. I got plans tonight!" Rigby yelled.

"No way, I'm going home and relaxing. You should too when you're done. Benson catches you sleeping again and he'll fire you."

Rigby sighed, "Whatever. I'll do it myself then."

"You want the usual?" Margaret asked after pouring them each a glass of coffee.

"No, this time I want something good," Rigby said, causing an outburst of laughter.

"Yeah, as long as it's good."

They both stopped laughing and looked towards Mordecai.

"Uh.. What's wrong with Eileen? She seems a little down today."

They looked in the direction of the register. Instead of coming over to talk with Rigby, she sat with her head on her arm, reading a magazine.

Margaret laughed nervously, "Oh, you know, just a long week. I'll be back with your order."

Sounded a little far-fetched, but he let it go.

"Dude I'm gonna order tickets tonight for the new zombie movie when it comes to the drive in, I'm gonna ask Margaret, why don't you ask Eileen?"

"Eh, she's not that bad, but I'm more of a lone hurricane, a bachelor!" he answered, pouring nearly the entire container of sugar in his coffee.

Mordecai took it before it was empty and began pouring into his own, "Come on dude, she likes you. Besides, I talked Benson into letting me use the old park truck."

"What do you need a truck for? You can drive the cart without a license!" said Rigby.

"Well, the cart isn't as fun as an actual car."

Rigby shook his head, "Don't rag on the cart."

"I'm not ragging on the cart, it's just getting kinda embarrassing driving it everywhere. Plus, I think it'll impress Margaret if we take it to the drive in."

"Fat chance," Rigby said quiet enough for him to not hear.

"What?"

"Nothing. You gotta let me drive it when it's done! There's a new mall opening a town over."

Mordecai shook his head, "No way, dude. You can't even reach the pedals. If you help fix it up, I'll let you drive it around the park."

"Lame! I'll stick with the cart, thank you."

**[][][]**

Several hours later, Mordecai wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked at the now clean garage. All the boxes were moved to the attic, and he had even replaced the bulbs to the burnt out lights.

The bench was empty, the tools that were covering it hung neatly on the wall in front of it.

Sighing happily, he turned off the stereo and walked into the house. Benson was talking on the phone, from the tone of his voice he could tell it wasn't the nicest one.

"Yes, sir… Yes, sir… No I won't, sir…"

At length he hung up the phone and sighed heavily.

"Oh, Mordecai, there you are," he said, noticing him standing in the doorway to the garage.

He tossed a key ring to him, watching as he looked at them.

"Whoa, are these for the truck?"

Benson nodded, "You bet, just got off the phone with Mr. Maellard."

"You didn't get in trouble did you? It didn't sound like it went so well."

"Well, it took some convincing, but I can handle him. Pop's helped talk him into it, so thank him when you see him."

"Totally, thanks again."

Mordecai walked up the stairs and opened the door to his room. Flipping the switch, the dark room illuminated as the overhead light sprang to life.

Seeing Rigby was gone, he assumed he went to wherever he had to go. He'd be suspicious if it was anyone other than Rigby, but he assumed he was just playing video games somewhere.

Walking to his bed, he unzipped his pillow case and pulled out the small key that was hidden inside. With key in hand, he crawled under his bed and drug out a hidden lockbox.

Opening it, he sat on the bed and starting sifting through it's contents. A rare Megalomaniac trading card from the 90's, a picture of him, Margaret, Rigby, and Eileen from their trip to the abandoned zoo, the ticket receipts he'd bought for the zombie movie, Dead Again: One Last Time.

Finally, he found the brown envelop, packed tight enough it was nearly ripped along the bottom. Opening it carefully, he started counting the money inside.

With the tickets already ordered, he had just under a thousand dollars saved from the past month of work he's done. He hoped it'd be enough to fix the truck, it looked pretty bad and he wasn't sure he could work the same schedule again if it wasn't.

Besides, most if not all of his plan to impress Margaret depended on the truck. All his other attempts had failed so far, and this was all that was left. He tried being the good guy, got beat up by the bad guy boyfriends.

Tried being the bad guy, got beat up by the good guy boyfriends.

He looked at the keys in his hand and felt a wave of calmness flow through him.

Little did he know, his life was about to change for the worse before it got better…

* * *

Well, there it is.

Not a bad beginning, if I say so myself, definitely not my worst.

Anyway, thanks reading. Got a couple stories to catch up on so I'll try to get the next one up as soon as I can.

Feel free to leave a review, ask a question, or send suggestion.


	2. (1) One Headlight

Alright, back again.

Got the PKMN mod for Minecraft, so I've been a little preoccupied lately. However, I've got my Monster in front of me and five stories that need updating, so let's see where we get to.

I always use song names as the title for either the story, the chapters, or both. If it gets annoying, let me know and I'll try to stop. The main reason I use them for chapters is so you know what I was most likely listening to when I typed it, that way you could listen as you read it.

Also, if you haven't, go check out the RWBY trailers on you tube, they're awesome and may come into play in this story or the next. They just released Yellow today.

I did some minor editing on the Prologue. Nothing major, so i didn't label it or include a changelog as i do sometimes. If i find a massive error while re-editing, i'll add the version number (Most Likely V1.1 unless it needs further editing) As well as saying what i changed.

Alright, hit the lights.

* * *

**Chapter 1: One Headlight**

"_Well, this place is old, it feels just like a beat up truck_

_I turn the engine, but the engine doesn't turn_

_Well it smells of cheap wine and cigarettes_

_This place is always such a mess_

_Sometimes I'd like to watch it burn…" _

_-Wallflowers_

**[][][]**

The hood of the truck creaked as it was raised, probably for the first time in a decade.

"Whoa," Mordecai said as he stared in awe at the size of the engine.

Skips chuckled, "Yeah, that's the proper response."

The engine was massive, bigger than the front end, judging by the saw marks from where pieces of the body were hacked and cut away to make room for it. While the removed panels seemed professionally cut, their purpose was more for safety, so it seemed they'd be best left in. Beneath the layers of dirt and tree limbs, the dry rotted belt hung from the pulleys, it's use long since needed.

"It came from the factory like this?"

Skips shook his head, "You kidding? The original V-6 engine was way smaller than this V-8. There's nothing original, motor wise, left in this beast."

Mordecai glanced over the engine again, noticing the hole from where the bumper was forced into the engine, "So, did Benson really wreck it racing?"

"No, he's been hiding behind that lie for years. No one in town was stupid enough to try racing against the Black Tear."

Mordecai turned toward Skips, "Then how'd it happen?"

Skips shook his head again and shrugged, "It's not for me to tell you. Just promise me you'll be careful when we get it running."

Mordecai nodded, "I promise."

"Alright, take these. Write down what I tell you to."

Mordecai took the notepad and pen while Skips crawled under the front end.

"First things first, oil change and full tune-up."

Mordecai wrote it down.

"Complete gasket set, Alternator, Battery, Water pump, Drive Belts, Charging Belts."

Mordecai nodded, "Okay."

Skips slid out, "How do you feel about air conditioning?"

Mordecai shrugged, "Whatever, as long as you're moving you can put the windows down."

Skips slid back under, "Good. That's an expensive fix, we'll get rid of everything for it, makes it faster too. Don't know why Benson wanted in the first place."

"What about the bumpers and stuff?"

"We'll have to order the aftermarket body kit, doesn't look right with an original after everything we cut to make the engine fit. Everything else we can get from a junkyard."

Mordecai added, Body Kit to the list, "Alright, what's next?"

Skips climbed to his feet and dusted off his hands, "A lot of hard work. We have to take the engine out to check the internal parts."

Mordecai looked to the truck. The idea of hard work would make an older Mordecai find a way around it. However, he was strangely eager to get started.

"Okay, where do we begin?"

**[][][]**

Skips looked at the clock on the wall and wiped sweat from his forehead, "Holy cow, it's past midnight!"

"No way," Mordecai said, not believing him.

"I'd say that's enough for tonight. At least we got the engine out."

Mordecai yawned, "Didn't think it'd take four hours."

"See you tomorrow,"

Mordecai waved and looked back to the metal stand the engine was attached to. From the stand, you could turn the entire motor over to make it easier to disassemble.

After putting away the tools, moving the stand to a far corner and sweeping the floor, he walked to the door that led to the house. He took one more glance at the truck before shutting off the lights.

Unable to sleep, he dropped onto the couch to begin reading the manual for his driver's test. After finding a show to listen to as he read, he tossed the remote onto the coffee table.

"Chapter one, road signs."

After about an hour of reading, the front door opened and Rigby walked in, yawning.

"Dude, you're just now getting home?"

He nodded, mumbling words that sounded like Thomas and Video Games.

"You were out playing video games this late?"

He nodded again, dropping onto the couch next to him, "Matcless Mayhem 2 comes out next week. They say you get to find out what happened to Matcless' dad. Plus they're having an tournament the night it comes out."

"Where at?"

Rigby seemed to think for a moment, eventually deciding on an answer, "That new mall opening a town over. Me and Thomas are gonna enter."

Mordecai turned the page of the book, only half listening, "Sounds like fun."

"Yeah. Let's play Crash City." Rigby said while tossing a remote at Mordecai.

Figuring he wouldn't get any reading done with Rigby yelling and sneakily increasing the volume on the TV, he tossed the book on the table, "Alright, one match."

As they selected their cars, Mordecai realized it had been nearly a week since he and Rigby had time to sit down like this and just relax. Rigby picked the large city that they'd compete in. Mordecai was thankful for that.

"It's been awhile since I played this one," Rigby stated, giving a reason he was playing worse than usual.

Mordecai nodded, "Yeah, we've both been busy lately. You with your tournament, me trying to impress Margaret."

"Yeah," Rigby answered halfheartedly.

Mordecai thought something was wrong, but told himself he was just focusing on the game.

"It's good to just relax and play some games."

Instead of their usual back and forth of threats, they finished the round in silence.

"Up for one more?"

Rigby shook his head and tossed the controller down, "No. I'm going to sleep."

"What's wrong? You won, I should be the one tossing the controller."

"Nothing, I'm just tired," he called from the stairs.

Mordecai sighed and switched back to cable, "Whatever."

The one time they have time to hang out, Rigby gets worked up over something.

He stretched out on the couch and flipped through the channels, 'He'll tell me what's wrong when he's ready.'

**[][][]**

"Alright, guys, time to get to work. Muscle Man, you and Fives go and get the birds off of the soccer field."

"You know who else likes to get birds off of the soccer field?" he asked, a grin spreading across his face.

Benson glared at him from over his clipboard.

"My mom…" he whispered, loud enough for everyone on the steps to hear.

Fives' slapped his hand and whispered, "Oh, yeah!"

Benson sighed, "Mordecai, you've been working a lot lately, so work the snack stand for today."

"Alright."

He flipped the page on the clipboard, "Thomas, I need you to take the cart into town and get some plants to replace the ones lost in the wind storm."

He nodded, "Sure."

"Rigby, it's your turn to-"

Benson stopped when he heard snoring.

"Dude, wake up!" Mordecai whispered loudly and punched him in the arm.

"What was that for!" he yelled, rubbing his aching shoulder.

"Rigby, you're going into town to hand out fliers for the annual park picnic," Benson said, keeping his anger under control.

"That doesn't seem too bad."

Benson pointed to something beside the steps, "Also, you have to wear the giant hot dog."

The costume was shaped like a large hotdog with a matching bun and mustard.

"What?!"

Mordecai looked at the costume, "Is it weird that none of us noticed that?"

Muscle Man shrugged, "I thought it was that dog that's been wandering around."

"You thought that was a dog?" Fives asked in disbelief.

"It's a big dog!"

Thomas shook his head, "But how do you explain the hot dog shape?"

Muscle Man jumped off the steps and started walking, "I know what I seen, bro!"

Fives flew off to catch up.

Rigby folded his arms, "I don't want to wear the hot dog."

Benson began writing in his clip board, "You have to wear the hot dog."

"Why do I have to wear the hot dog?"

"You have to wear the hot dog because you've been slacking off more than usual. Think of it as punishment for sleeping on the job."

"No way! I don't sleep on the job! Well, except for yesterday…"

Benson began to turn red, "I don't have time for this! Get the fliers from the house and get started! Don't let me catch you with it off either!"

Rigby sighed, "Great."

"It's not all that bad, at least it'll make you look taller." Mordecai said once Benson walked away.

Rigby kicked the costume, "You know, I was just talking about how much I wanted to be taller and hot dog shaped…"

"Look on the bright side," Mordecai said while looking up, "At least it's not supposed to rain today."

"Ha, ha."

Mordecai sighed, "Look, give me half of the fliers, I'll hand them out at the stand. That way, you'll be done quicker."

"Thanks, dude, I'll go grab them," he said, running past Thomas.

Thomas slung his backpack over his shoulder and started walking toward the cart.

"Hey, Thomas."

He stopped and looked back to Mordecai, "What's up?"

"Can I borrow your laptop?"

He dropped his backpack and unzipped it, pausing once he grabbed the computer, "What do you need it for?"

"Well," Mordecai began, opening his notepad, "I have to order a few things for the truck."

"Oh, alright. I'll get it back from you later."

Mordecai tucked it under his arm, "Thanks."

He watched him drive off in the cart until he heard the door to the house close, "Here."

Mordecai took the fliers, noticing he was handed the majority.

Rigby picked up the hot dog and struggled to remain balanced, "I'm gonna go see if I can talk Margaret into putting the rest at the register of the diner."

"You might have more luck with Eileen," he yelled after him.

Rigby yelled something, but it wasn't loud enough for Mordecai to hear clearly.

Mordecai shrugged and walked off to the snack stand.

**[][][]**

"Here you go," he said, handing a hot dog to the customer who thanked him and walked off.

His clever idea to put a flier under the hot dog in place of a napkin helped hand out most of the pile he was given.

He checked to see if anymore customers were gonna walk up before returning to the laptop. After searching for nearly an hour, he found an entire body kit online that looked closest to the one already on the truck.

The price was a little steep, but it wasn't too bad, considering it came with everything and he already gave Skips the money to get everything else. After selecting rush shipping, he clicked the 'Buy Now' button and waited for the page to load.

"Aw, man."

The only payment method was a credit card, and all he had was cash.

The idea hit him. He pulled the park credit card out of his wallet. He typed the numbers in, but stopped before clicking to confirm. He wrestled the urge to click and grabbed his walkie talkie. He turned the knob to the private channel that Benson was usually on.

"Hey, Benson, you there?"

For a couple moments, static came through the speaker.

"Yeah, what is it?"

He waited a moment, trying to decide if it's even worth asking.

"Uh, I want to order something online for the truck, but they only accept credit cards. If I give you the money, could I use the park card?"

This time, the pause was much longer.

"No… I don't want the park's card used online."

"Alright," Mordecai said, making sure he let go of the button before he sighed.

As he started deleting the numbers, the static stopped again, "Are you still at the stand? As long as it's for the truck, I'll let you use mine."

"Yeah, I'm still there. Thanks."

Muscle Man's voice echoed through the static, "Lame."

"This channel is for emergencies!" Benson yelled.

"This is an emergency, unlike trucks. There's a group of sentient turkeys on the field, one of them's huge!"

In the background, Fives' voice came through.

"Come here, turkey, no one's going to eat you," Fives said, trying to reason with it.

"Speak for yourself, bro," Muscle Man yelled, "I haven't had lunch,"

Suddenly, the sound of loud gobbling came through the walkie, along with Thomas' voice, "Help! Thanksgiving's revolting!"

"I told you not to name them!"

Benson sighed, "I'll be there in a second. Mordecai, come give us a hand."

Mordecai switched back to his channel and began to close up the stand.

**[][][]**

By the time Mordecai got to the soccer field, chaos had ensued.

There were turkeys everywhere, running up and down the field, chasing Thomas, and a campfire made from rocks was burning in the middle of the field.

Mordecai walked to the group that was watching Thomas.

Fives sighed, "I told you it wouldn't work."

"Yeah, did you expect them to jump in the fire and cook themselves?" Benson asked, shaking his head.

Muscle Man stood with his arms folded, "I was hoping they would."

"That's it Thomas, tire them out!" Fives yelled.

Amid his panting he called back, "Got it!"

"Benson, give me the key to the cart, I have an idea."

Benson tossed it to Mordecai, "Any chance it involves a side of gravy?"

"No."

Benson sighed, "Now I'm getting hungry."

Mordecai jumped in he cart and sped off towards the diner. Parking at the curb, he ran inside and looked around. Not seeing Margaret, he walked to the counter where Eileen sat.

"Eileen, has Rigby been here today?"

She sighed, "Yeah, he dropped off his hot dog and left."

"Where is it?"

"Hold on, I'll get it."

She hopped off the stool at the counter and walked through the doors to the kitchen.

'She seems in an even worse mood than before,' he thought, noticing she no longer enjoyed conversations involving Rigby.

Seconds later, the doors opened and the hot dog made it's way through the doors.

"Here you go."

Mordecai took the costume and leaned it against the counter, "Thanks, would you happen to have any rope or something to tie it with?"

She shook her head, "I haven't seen any around, what's it for?"

"There's an outbreak of turkeys on the soccer field."

She gave him a weird look, "Turkeys?"

He nodded, "I know, I know."

Eileen looked over the counter, "What about this?"

She walked around and grabbed a coil of Licorice, "It's stale, but it's super strong."

Mordecai took it and tried to pull it apart, "It just might work, thanks."

"No problem. Good luck."

Mordecai ran outside and set the hot dog in the passenger seat of the cart, taking a last glance for Rigby. Not seeing him, he raced off toward the field.

Things had escalated since he was gone.

Muscle Man was squealing while he rolled on the ground to put out the flames that covered him. Fives was blowing on them, instead of putting them out, he succeeded in making them bigger.

Benson came running over with a fire extinguisher and put out the small fires that had spread in his absence before running to Muscle Man.

"Hold still!" he yelled as he began spraying him.

The fire went out and Muscle Man climbed to his feet, panting, "Thanks, bro."

Suddenly the fire returned from no where, causing him to take off running. Benson looked at the extinguisher for a moment, then began chasing after him.

Mordecai looked to where Thomas was still running, visibly slower than before. He slammed on the pedal and the cart took off toward him.

"It's Turkey-geddon!" Thomas yelled as the angry birds began to catch up to him.

Mordecai got as close as he could and twirled the Licorice like a lasso over the frightened goat.

"Gotcha!" he yelled as he jerked the rope back and pulled him into the cart.

Thomas took deep breaths as he pulled the rope over his head, "Thanks, man! I thought I was a goner!"

"Don't thank me yet," he said as he looked in the rear-view mirror, "Now we're being followed by the whole herd."

Mordecai drove in circles, making sure there weren't any stragglers that were hiding.

"Ok, Thomas, use this to tie the hot dog to the roof."

Thomas took the rope and sighed, "Man, I hate Licorice more than I do turkeys."

Mordecai slowed down while Thomas tied the rope around his waist and climbed onto the roof. He tugged on his life line to make sure it'd hold and tied the rest around the hot dog.

"Alright!"

Mordecai split from the field and started driving out of the park. He swerved to avoid a bump in the road, but it was too late. The impact bounced the cart into the air, causing it to land heavily. Thomas screamed as he was launched off of the roof.

"Thomas! Where are you?!" Mordecai yelled, looking in the mirror.

Thomas was hanging off the passenger side of the roof with his arms crossed, "Oh, you know, just hanging around."

Mordecai sighed and grabbed his walkie talkie that was yelling in Benson's voice, "We got the turkeys following us, we'll lead them out of town and ditch the hot dog."

"Alright. I guess Rigby got out of wearing the costume after all. Bring the cart back when you're done and call it a day."

Mordecai put the walkie in the seat beside him and looked in the mirror. The turkeys were still following them.

"How long do I have to hang here?"

Mordecai shrugged, "As long as the rope will hold."

He looked up at the Licorice he was hanging from, "I don't like the sound of that."

Mordecai began swerving back and forth, "Still holding?"

"Not cool!" he yelled as he began swinging.

Mordecai started laughing, "Aw, come on, that looks fun!"

* * *

I think that's a good place to stop.

Well, some time's gonna skip between this and the next chapter, just to get to the main plot quicker. I'll try to throw a funny story like the ending in every now and then to keep you from getting bored.

Anyway, as always, Thanks for reading, and_ see you next time._


	3. (2) Secret Loser

Welcome back.

My Works Word Processor has been buggy lately, so there's a good chance what you're reading has been typed more than three times.

I wanted to have this up yesterday, but I found something I'd been hiding in the fridge, so we'll just say I wasn't in the state of mind to be typing…

Anyway, back to what you came to see.

* * *

**Chapter 2: Secret Loser**

"_Trapped in a lonely body, I'm losin' control,_

_Can't show my emotions, and I'm losing my soul,_

_Could it be that I'm obsessed, with feeding my disease?_

_Couldn't make it know the hidden things that no one sees._

_Yeah, Loser._

_I'm a secret loser…"_

- Ozzy Osbourne

**[][][]**

Mordecai stood and wiped the sweat from his forehead. He was surprised by how quick it started to look like a truck again.

The new body kit was installed and primed for paint, as was other areas that they'd redone to get rid of the rust that had begun to pop up. It kinda looked like a reverse cow, with the black paint and the various splotches of gray primer.

The engine, however, looked nothing like the outside. Every thing under the hood was painted red before they put the engine back and it mixed well with the engine's now almost entirely chrome parts.

Skips had rigged up something he called a snorkel. It consisted of a plastic pipe that ran under the fender and connected to what he said was the intake. From out of the fender, it ran along the driver side window and bolted to the a-pillar. Apparently it was for driving through high water. There was a similar pipe in the back that he said was to attach to the muffled.

Skips' was looking over their progress, a pleased expression on his face.

"You finish the brakes?"

Mordecai nodded, "Yeah, just finished them."

Skips' gave one last look over the engine, "We're ready to see if it'll start."

"Really? I thought it was coming along fast, but not that fast."

"That's the beauty of old cars, there's nothing complicated to worry about. Makes'em easier to work on. Sit in the seat and turn the key when I tell you to."

Mordecai sat behind the wheel, checking to make sure the key was in the ignition.

He looked through the window they replaced from the junkyard and wiped a spot of dust away. Without the hood on, he could see the entire engine from the interior.

"Alright, go ahead!"

Mordecai turned the key and the engine began cranking. It took a long time before they received any sign of progress. It began to sputter.

"Give it a little gas."

Mordecai moved his foot over the gas pedal and pushed down about half way.

Suddenly, from the top of the motor a flame spit out, growing steadily bigger. Out of panic, he let go of the gas and stopped cranking.

"No, keep going!"

Mordecai gulped away his fear and turned the key again. As it resumed cranking, the flame disappeared with a sucking sound. Had he not been startled, the sound would have been funny.

Seconds later, the engine rumbled to life.

"Ohhhhhhh!"

Skips laughed, "Well, I didn't think it'd be that easy."

"So what's next?"

Skips reached over and pushed the button for the garage door, "Now we take it for a test drive."

Mordecai gave the truck another look, "Really? It's ready for it?"

"Yeah, just once around the park won't hurt. Actually, if everything goes alright, you could go and take the test next week."

'The movie's this Friday,' he thought.

Mordecai jumped in the passenger seat while Skips took the place behind the wheel. He tapped the gas twice, causing the engine to rev higher. Mordecai felt the nervousness grow inside him. What if there was a problem? What if something went wrong.

"Don't worry, we'll check the brakes first."

Skips reached down and moved the shifter to drive. There was a clunk as the gear engaged and they began rolling out of the garage.

Letting go of the brake pedal, they started to idle forward. He began pumping the pedal and the truck began intermittently jumping.

"Seems fine."

Mordecai laughed nervously then quickly buckled his seat belt.

"Good idea," Skips said as a grin crept across his face.

**[[][]]**

They sat at the entrance to the campgrounds that had been closed a couple years back. Well, it was closed to everyone except park personnel, and unfortunately, they were…

"Alright, ready to see what she can do?"

Mordecai nodded, not finding his voice.

Skips hit the button for the fog lights and revved the engine, holding down the gas pedal.

From it's full rev, he dropped into drive. The wheel's spun with a flurry of gravel and the front end lifted off the ground as they launched down the trail. They rocketed along, the engine roaring as they reached the first turn.

"Skips, that's a turn ahead."

He kept the pedal down.

"Skips?"

The needle for the speedometer kept climbing.

"Skips!"

Before it was too late, he hit the brakes and cut the wheel, sliding through the corner at an excess of fifty miles an hour. Correcting the wheels, they continued until they came to the clearing where the campers would stay.

"Man was that nerve-wracking!" said Mordecai, believing the drive was over.

Skips chuckled slammed on the throttle while turning the wheel. The truck growled and began to spin in a circle. Eventually, Skips started to turn the wheel back to it's original position, causing their circle to become wider and wider.

"A warning would have been nice," he mumbled while he rubbed his right shoulder.

"You wanna know the best thing about this?"

Mordecai blinked, "There's more?"

Skips pulled the gear for the four wheel drive into low. They idled over to where a large stack trees had been cut down and arranged in a pile.

"No way."

The front tires bumped the lowest log and stopped. Skips increased the pressure on the throttle and it began to climb up the stack.

"We're climbing them?"

Skips nodded, "This truck can do almost anything. We'll need to lower the suspension soon. It's too tall for how fast it is, cornering would be an issue."

Once they reached the top, Skips shifted to park and unbuckled his seatbelt, "Alright, your turn to drive back."

Mordecai leaned out of the window, looking down at the ground from what had to be twenty feet in the air.

"Seriously?!"

**[][][]**

Mordecai stood in one of the longest lines he'd ever seen. There had to be twenty, maybe thirty people in front of him, yet there was only one worker at the booth, the rest were behind the desk playing cards.

He sighed and used the time to look over his written test. He was worried about his answers for the road signs, but everything else was common sense.

"How about this line?"

Turning, he faced the bored looking owner of the voice, wearing a black t-shirt and baggy camouflage khakis. His hair was black and shaggy, covering most of the upper half of his face.

Mordecai nodded, "Yeah, you'd think they'd open another line or something."

He blinked for a moment and looked him over, "That voice, you wouldn't happen to be Mordecai, would you?"

"Yeah, how'd you know?"

He laughed, "Man, I seen that show you did. Mordecai and The Rigby's. It was great."

Mordecai sighed on the inside, remembering how embarrassing it was, "Yeah. It was all fake though."

"Yeah, figured that out right away. Still, you've got a great singing voice, and whoever made the guitar tracks were talented."

"That's a long story."

He looked over his shoulder, "Looks like you're up."

The line had disappeared, leaving him to be next.

"Here's my test."

The woman behind the desk took his test and started grading it. After nearly a minute, she stamped it.

"You passed. Barely. Are you ready for the driving portion?"

He nodded, "Yeah."

She gave him a clipboard, "Wait outside by your vehicle for the test giver and fill out the forms.

**[][][]**

As he filled out the form, he realized how nervous he was. On the way to the DMV, Skips had said it wasn't a good idea to take the test with only two days of practice, but if he was gonna ask Margaret to the movies, he'd need his license today.

"Make and Model."

He couldn't remember what Skips had said it was. If Skips hadn't left while he took his test, he could of helped fill it out.

'It's not a big deal,' he thought.

To be honest, Skips and even Benson had helped him out a lot lately. Way more than he's ever done for them.

'I'll have to find a way to thank them.'

He wrote down, 'Truck' for both questions.

The kid from inside started across the lot and stopped beside Mordecai, "Not bad. Little 'American' for my tastes, but not a bad car."

"Thanks?" Mordecai answered, unsure if it was an insult or not.

He nodded, "Don't worry, it's a compliment, specially coming from me. I'm more into foreign cars."

"Really? What are you driving?"

He pointed across the lot to a large four-door car. The front of it was blue, but the rear-end was yellow and missing a bumper.

"It's that thing."

Mordecai squinted, "Is the seat on the right side?"

"Yeah, hard to get used to, but after awhile it's fun."

"What happened to the bumper?"

At this he sighed, "My dad got rear-ended awhile ago, almost disintegrated everything. The only downside of fiberglass. Talked him out of junking it when I was a kid, and here it sits now."

"Martin! How's it going, Bro-seph?!"

A similarly aged man wearing a DMV uniform walked up and started hitting Martin.

"Wassup, Lyle?! You ready?"

He nodded, "Yeah, hope you're ready to fail."

"Once you're in the car, you get out where I want you too. Whether that's here, or a state over is a different story."

"Whatever," Lyle yelled while taking another swing at him.

Mordecai watched their exchange, doing his best to not laugh. I mean, come on, who says Bro-seph?

"See you around, Mordecai."

Lyle turned to him, "Oh, you got Carl. If you're low on points, ask him if he wants to stop for food."

Mordecai nodded, "Will do."

Lyle jumped in the passenger seat of Martin's car. The engine started and he revved it loudly. It didn't sound anything like the truck. It had a more… tinny, almost metallic rumble to it.

With a screech of tires, it left the lot and sped down the road.

"Mordecai?"

The tester stood behind him, wheezing from his short walk to where he was parked.

Mordecai wondered if he'd even fit in the car.

After checking the lights and mirrors, they left the lot to begin the test. Almost immediately, he started losing points.

"Failure to use turn signal. Abrupt turn. Improper lane change."

He shook his head while he began writing down his mistakes, causing Mordecai to wonder if he really had rushed into the test.

"Do you… wanna stop for some burgers?"

Carl stopped writing and clicked his pen closed.

**[][][]**

Mordecai parked in the same spot and shut off the engine.

"Well, you passed. This will serve as your temporary license until yours comes in the mail."

He took the paper and looked it over while Carl left. It had all his information, including a black and white picture of himself.

He walked over to where Skips was talking to Martin.

"… I did the engine before I started on the body." Martin said as he slammed the hood.

"How'd you do?"

Mordecai held up the paper, "I don't know, you tell me."

Skips nodded, "Well done. I didn't think you'd get it with only a couple days of driving."

"So, where'd you have to go?"

Looking down, Skips picked up the bags, "I got paint for the truck. We can start this weekend."

"Sounds good."

Martin thumbed through the keys on his ring, "Alright, I'm gonna get out of here. See ya around."

"See ya."

Mordecai waved as sped out of the lot.

"That's gonna be a nice car once he finishes it."

Mordecai started the truck, "It sounds good."

Skips nodded, "They're fast from the factory. That one has to have close to six-hundred horsepower."

"No way. The truck's faster though, right?"

"I don't know, it comes down to the driver. In a side by side race, that car would beat the truck off the line every time, maybe even to the finish. However, it's engine is made to pick up speed quicker, so in a straight drag, the truck could catch up and potentially pass it."

Mordecai revved the engine, "Let's see it do that, though."

**[][][]**

'Alright, got the tickets, wallet, jacket. Should be everything.'

He looked around the room in case he missed anything. Flipping off the switch, he walked downstairs and into the kitchen. Pop was sitting at the table, reading the newspaper.

Mordecai glanced at the headline, 'Rabid Turkeys Destroy Downtown Greenville.'

Pops noticed him enter and smiled, "Hello, Mordecai."

"Hey, Pops."

He turned back to the paper, "So, where are you off to this fine evening?"

Mordecai grabbed the keys for the truck off the rack hanging on the wall, "Heading to the drive-in. Gonna catch the new zombie movie."

"Oh, how fun! Is Rigby going along?"

Mordecai shook his head, "Nah, him and Thomas are entering a video game competition, so they're practicing tonight."

"I see."

Mordecai walked to the door leading to the garage and stopped, remembering that he'd forgot to thank him, "Oh, Pops, thanks for helping talk your dad into letting me use the old truck."

He waved his hand in the air, "Think nothing of it. It wasn't serving any use to anyone in it's past condition. I still have memories of the days I'd sneak the old jalopy out of the family car-park. I believe it was the third year of the sixties when-"

Mordecai could see this was going to be a long conversation, "See you later, Pops."

He snapped out of his rant, "Oh, alright, see you later. Have fun!"

**[][][]**

He started the walk to Margaret's door. Every step felt as if it would shatter the world around him. His heartbeat began to speed up and pound in his eardrums. He wondered if he'd be able to go through with it.

Facing the door, he struggled against the nagging voice that was telling him to call it off and go home, the voice that was pointing out the holes in his plan.

He shook away the demons, 'No, it has to work.'

His finger hovered over the doorbell for a moment before pushing it.

The faint voice inside exchanged words with another before footsteps started to the door.

'Here it goes.'

The knob turned and the door opened, however it wasn't Margaret.

"Oh, hey Mordecai."

Mordecai sighed, "Eileen, how's it going?"

"Same as usual… Unfortunately."

"Oh. Is Margaret here?"

Eileen hesitated for a moment, "Yeah, but she's with her new boyfriend, and to tell you the truth it's not a pretty sight."

"Really…"

She nodded, "Afraid so."

Mordecai sighed again, "Oh well, thanks anyway."

"No problem."

Mordecai turned to leave, but stopped before she closed the door.

"Wait."

She pulled it back open and blinked, "Yes?"

Mordecai wrestled with the idea for a moment, "Actually, I have tickets to the zombie flick at the drive in. I was gonna ask Margaret, but… Would you wanna go? Rigby's busy tonight, so it'd end up going to waste."

"Well…" a burst of laughter came from inside the apartment, "Sure, why not. I'll meet you downstairs."

"Alright."

As the door closed, he turned and walked back to the elevator, hands in his pockets, and the unmistakable feeling of defeat emanating from the walls, as if they felt his pain.

'Well another failed plan.'

The elevator dinged as the doors opened and he stepped inside.

'Oh well, the night isn't ruined. I guess I'll lick my wounds and think of something else.'

* * *

Alright, got a lot covered in this one. I'll probably get started on the next one right after I upload this, but I don't know when it'll be up.

Anyway, thanks for reading_. Last one out, hit the lights._


	4. (3) Make You Cry (Part 1)

Hey guys, sorry if this is a little late. I sold one of my cars and bought another as a project, so I've been a little busy trying to fix it.

Anyway, last chapter we found out Margaret has a new boyfriend, and Mordecai asked Eileen to go instead. I'm sure many of you weren't happy about it, but it'll make sense later on.

Also, if you don't know who Jonathan Coulton is, look him up. He's an amazing musician who releases all his work under a Creative Commons License, so you can use it for videos, stories, whatever. Plus his songs are incredible.

I don't really do this a lot, but I'd like to ask for some help with another genre. I want to start writing in the PPG section, but I really don't read in it. So, if anyone has experience in that genre, if you'd message me and answer a few questions, I'd really appreciate it. I just want to make sure the idea I have isn't used too much in that section.

Alright, let's go.

EDIT: V1.1- Made some changes to errors in grammar and some misspelling. My word processor has been acting up with spellcheck lately, going to search for another.

* * *

**Chapter 3: Make You Cry (Part 1)**

"_I drove seven hours  
All day to see you  
__The least that you could do is be at home  
I wait outside the front door  
I guess that I surprised us both  
When you get home you're not alone  
The way I thought you'd be  
You introduce your friend_

_On some sunny day you're gonna fall for me  
The way I fell for you  
That's when I'm gonna make you cry"_

_- __**Jonathan Coulton**_

**[][][]**

He leaned against the door, contemplating his next plan while reflecting on how he could have done better.

It was when the dome light kicked on that he looked in a direction other than the windshield, "Ready?"

Eileen nodded, "Yup. Nice truck by the way."

"Thanks."

He turned the key, the loud roar of the engine causing her to jump and look around, "Geez, I wasn't expecting that."

Mordecai laughed as he started toward the road leading out of town, "You get used to it after awhile."

"So," Eileen began, breaking the unsettling silence, "New truck, tickets to a zombie movie, and it's at a drive in. You really went all out this time."

He laughed again, politely enough to cover his embarrassment, "Yeah. Didn't prepare for the possibility of a boyfriend though."

"Well, that's hard to account for. Where'd you get the truck?"

"It's the park's old truck. Benson let me use it since it was wrecked and just sitting. Skips helped me get it running, and here it is now."

"That's pretty cool. I know you and Rigby complain about him a lot." her mentioning his name seemed to leave a bad taste in her mouth.

"Yeah, sometimes he can be annoying, but we tend to bring it on ourselves a lot. Really it's like having a second family."

Eileen nodded, "It used to be the same way at the diner."

"You mind me asking what happened with you and Rigby? Seems like it's been awhile since you two said anything to each other," Mordecai asked while slowing down to make a corner.

"He's a jerk."

He regretted bringing it up, "That's just the way he is. He grows on you after awhile."

"Since we're on the subject, what's your plans with Margaret? She's been real annoying lately."

"How so?" he asked, his attention focused more on the road.

Eileen sighed, "You know how she gets around her boyfriends."

"Ah. Well, between you and me, Margaret doesn't have the best track record in the boyfriend department. I figure by this time next week she'll be single again."

"I sure hope so. I'm actually thinking of moving back into my old apartment."

He swung around a tree that had fallen into the road from the wind that had began to pick up, "It's that bad?"

She nodded, "It's unbearable! He's always making bad jokes, and she just laughs like it's the funniest thing ever."

"Well, if you need help, the truck could fit a lot in the back."

"Thanks. I hope it doesn't come to that, but maybe it'll get better."

The silence returned.

**[][][]**

The traffic picked up as they began to get closer to the drive-in. There were more trucks than cars, seeing as the local roads changed from comfortable pavement to gravel and dirt, providing a more bumpy ride.

After half a mile of idling, they made it into the lot for the drive-in.

The projector was near the middle of the area and raised a good thirty feet off the ground, fully illuminating the hundred foot screen. He followed the lane for trucks and backed into a spot along the back wall. From where they were parked everything else was downhill, giving them a pretty good view of everything.

"How about some snacks?"

Eileen nodded, "Can't have a zombie movie without snacks."

"By the way, have you seen the first movie?" Mordecai asked as they walked, retracing their drive from the entrance.

"Yeah, it wasn't as good as the trailers made it look."

"Exactly! A robot fighting hordes of zombies sounded stupid, but the ending made up for everything!"

She laughed loudly, causing a few people nearby to take notice, "Yeah, and he's all like, 'I am made to live!' But seriously, the bloody claw clenching as he became infected with the virus was a good setup to the sequel."

"Definitely. I wonder how they'll start it."

They stepped in line and looked over the menu hung over the counter, "What should we get?"

"Hey, Mordecai."

He turned around to see CJ and Thomas in line behind them, "Oh, hey. What's up guys?"

Thomas looked nervous and avoided eye contact, "You know, just seeing the zombie movie."

"So, how's things with that Margaret?" CJ asked, looking around, "She parking the car or something?"

Thomas gave her a nudge.

Mordecai didn't notice, "She's actually with her boyfriend tonight, and I had an extra ticket so I asked Eileen to go."

"Hey."

Just noticing her, CJ smiled, "Oh, I get it. Friendzoned?"

Mordecai sighed, "Not exactly…"

Thomas nudged her again.

"Ow! What's that for?"

He laughed nervously, "Sorry, arm must of slipped."

"Oh, wait, weren't you and Rigby supposed to be practicing tonight?"

Thomas coughed, "Oh, uh, we practiced for a while, then he left, because I had plans tonight."

CJ gave him a confused look, "When I called, you said you were-"

Thomas grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the next line farther down the counter, "Another line opened! Don't miss the movie, guys!"

Mordecai turned back to Eileen, "Did it look like they're acting weird?"

She shook her head quickly, "Oh, you know, probably just nervous about the movie."

At length he nodded, "Yeah, that's it. I remember him saying the first one scared him."

**[][][]**

The desolate highway stretched on as the heavy footsteps echoed. The shadow appears over the camera before the source becomes visible. A close up of the figures boots appear as he walks down the middle of the road, away from the camera, slowly revealing a white lab coat and large cowboy hat.

"After I lost my son to the virus," a gruff voice begins the voiceover, "I soon realized how doomed we were."

The camera switches to another that followed the boots as he walked.

"He was immune, at least I thought he was. If someone such as him can become infected, I knew the dead returning to life was only the beginning."

The camera slowly pans up until it's head height, showing only a turned up collar and the shadow cast from the hat.

"We were arrogant. We thought we could stop them."

The figure stops walking as the sound metallic shuffling echoes from farther ahead. The camera cuts to show a group of survivors scavenging through a pile-up. They look toward the camera before it returns to the figure as a gust of wind blows the hat away, showing a square computer monitor with a cracked screen that's blinking green.

"We were wrong."

The robot's screen flickers to read the phrase 'eRRor: conTamINatION.'

The camera changes to a shot of a brown, rocky hillside farther away from the highway as the sound of gunshots and lasers ring out.

In bloody, red letters, the title appears.

Dead Again: One Last Time.

**[][][]**

Inside the military bunker, gunshots ring out from off camera, the shot being of a dark corridor in a winding maze of hallways beneath ground.

The form of a person passes the hall farther down, in full sprint. Seconds later, a horde of the undead run past, nearly matching his speed.

From the hall closer, the same boots pass directly in front of the camera, walking at a leisurely pace.

The scene cuts to a jarring view of the survivor as he turns down a hall and speeds along.

A division of the horde comes into view ahead of him, causing him to slide to a stop and turn down the next closest, bursting through a door at the end.

The instant the door is opened, he is blinded by the sunlight reflecting off the glass panes of the communication towers.

He looks around a moment before slamming the door and bracing it closed with a nearby pipe.

He walks backwards slowly, wincing at the sound of the undead slamming against the door, their shrieking and groaning muffled by the thick steel.

Turning, the camera gets a good shot of his face, a square-jawed, crew cut soldier in a white tank top and camo fatigues.

He walks to the edge of the railing overlooking the installation, his boots grinding on the gravel from the cracks spider webbed along the concrete walls.

The view is of the city on the outskirts of the base, the last haven of the non-infected, still smoldering from it's downfall the night before.

In the heat of the moment, he forgot all about his task.

Fumbling through his pockets, he eventually pulls out a flash-drive, sighing out of relief that it's still in one piece. From his other pocket he pulls out the note and begins skimming it again, making sure he remembered his instructions.

The camera swings to show the robot from the beginning walk out of the shadows.

The sound of a laser pierces the air before the camera shows the soldier fall forward in slow motion.

As he collapses on the ground, he grips the flash drive and let go of the note, the wind carrying it over the railing, toward the city.

He rolls over as the shadow of the robot stretches over him. They stare at each other a moment before the claw grips him around the throat and raises him in the air.

Fighting against the steel grip of the claw, he swings futiley, his punches hitting the metallic skin of the monitor.

The screen begins to lose color until completely black and white, as he manages to plug the drive into the USB slot.

As he does so, however, the screen becomes blurry, and indistinguishable as he becomes limp and lifeless.

The robot tosses him aside while turning toward the steel door. Ripping the pipe out, he steps in, the zombies having wandered off.

He continues the walk out of the base before reaching the road to the city when he stopped in mid-step.

The red flashing sped up until completely flickering to a blank screen. The camera focuses on the screen of the robot as it flashes back to life while the words, 'Rebooting…' appeared.

After a moment, the friendly, pixilated face of the hero of the first movie returns.

The eyes glance around before focusing on the city.

"I'm… back?" a high-pitched robotic voice asks.

He looks over the ruins, his scans showing nothing but casualties. He frowns, changing his view to the image of his blood stained claws.

The wind encircles him, sending a piece of paper into his face. He blinked as he began to read it, the voice the same as the narration in the beginning of the movie.

"After I lost my son to the virus I soon realized how doomed we were. He was immune, at least I thought he was. If someone such as him can become infected, I knew the dead returning to life was only the beginning. We were arrogant. We thought we could stop them. We were wrong.

"After the outbreak, I built him. Rob-O."

The robot looks at the panel on his chest, the dirty and dented steel bearing only the outline of 'Rob'.

"He was to be the first of many to protect the living from the dead, but if he can succumb to the infection, there is no hope. Even as he fights his way to me, I only regret that which a father does most. The inability to save his son.

"I have created an antidote and stored in the military base outside of Haven before taking shelter in my home. I'm tired of fighting an unwinnable war. If you're reading this, the last hope for humanity is Rob-O's salvation protocol. Only after the antidote is administered can we begin to survive."

The rest of the note is covered in the professor's blood.

Rob-O looks up from the note. He glances back to the tower he was just at and then to the town below. He lets go of the note, the wind reclaiming it and sending it away.

He nods and begins walking toward the camera, his screen flashing the word, 'Salvation.'

The camera pans to the sky as the words, 'The End' appear, shortly changing to 'The End?'

After a black screen, it focuses on the face of the soldier as his eyes snap open. He blinks and looks around as the shrieks and growls of the undead become louder before he starts screaming, bringing the black screen back as the words now show, 'The End.'

**[][][]**

Mordecai and Eileen both began to shout, following the whoops and cheers that began around the parking lot.

"Ok, I'll admit, that was actually pretty good."

Mordecai shrugged, "It wasn't as bad as i thought it'd be. My favorite part was the ending."

"Because it was over?"

"Sorta."

Eileen buckled her seat belt while he started the engine, "Come on, it definitely beat the first one."

He shrugged and he pulled out of the lot and through the entrance, "Well, it was more pleasing to the eye but it lacked story and the plot was all over the place."

"You men," she began, "Always focused on story over senseless violence."

"Well excuse me for appreciating responsible writing."

They both laughed at the joke before they seen the line of cars waiting to leave. A fallen tree was blocking the road ahead, causing the traffic to back up and stop them from progressing.

Amid the wind and blaring of horns, he sighed, "What?! Man, this is gonna take forever!"

"Maybe the wind'll blow it out of the way. Like, if all the cars arranged in the perfect order to cause a cross-draft strong enough to budge it to the side-"

Mordecai shook his head, "Yeah… I don't think that'll happen."

She crossed her arms, "Well, at least I'm trying to find a solution."

Mordecai looked along the road, dozens of cars ahead, and even more lining up behind him. To the right, there was a section of guard rail missing from an accident, exposing a dirt trail that led into the woods surrounding the area.

"I have an idea."

He dropped the four-wheel drive lever into high and turned off the road, going over the side of the embankment and into the ditch. He slammed onto the throttle, causing the truck to climb the incline and reach the trail.

From behind them came cheers and shouts as they started into the forest.

"See, no problem for mega truck." he added with a nod.

"Well, what're we gonna do about that?"

He looked to where she was pointing and slammed on the brakes.

In front of them was a river that was swollen from a past rainstorm. The current looked to be pretty strong, and there was no sign of a bridge. He glanced to the side of his window and seen the snorkel Skips had told him about.

"Another idea," he said as he opened the door and zipped up his jacket.

"Where're you going?"

He ran to the back of the truck and opened the hatch. After fumbling in the back he eventually found the hose he had left inside.

He quickly slid the hose over the exhaust and attached it along the side like he was shown.

"So, what's the plan?" she asked, as he switched to low and revved the engine.

"We make like our ancestors and cross it."

She shook her head, "You've got to be kidding."

"Come on, it'll be fine."

At length, Eileen sighed, "I guess we don't have much of a choice."

* * *

Alright, pretty good cliff-hanger I think.

So, thanks for reading, and if you have any info or advice to offer, send me a message and I'll tell you my idea so far.

_See you, Space Cowboy. _(Couldn't help it. ^^)


	5. (4) Make You Cry (Part 2)

Next chapter.

[][][]

**Chapter 4: Make You Cry (Part 2)**

"_Ten bucks to buy you flowers  
__You say they're pretty  
__And you put them in a vase and say goodnight  
Not quite what I had hoped for  
Me, I've got nothing left but time  
To try again and it's alright  
Because I know you care  
You just don't care for me_

_On some sunny day you're gonna fall for me  
The way I fell for you_

_That's when I'm gonna make you cry_"

_- Jonathan Coulton_

* * *

Thomas sighed and rapped his fingers on the steering wheel, "We're never gonna get out of here."

"Why didn't you follow Moredecai?"

He let a short laugh out, "We're not exactly in a truck, y'know?"

CJ continued leaning against the door.

Thomas glanced over, "Something wrong?"

She thought a moment before answering, "What was up with you earlier?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, pretending he didn't understand.

"When we were talking to them before the movie, you got all paranoid and drug us to another line."

"Oh. Well, you know, that's a touchy subject with Mordecai."

She turned and looked at him. He kept glancing between her and the windshield while clearing his throat.

"You're not telling me something."

He laughed and shook his head, "No, come on, you're talking crazy…"

She held her gaze until he sighed.

"It's a long story, okay?"

She looked back through the windshield, "Well, we got time."

**[][][]**

Mordecai laughed as he threw the shifter into park outside the apartment building, "As if. That's nearly impossible."

"We'll see who's laughing when swarms of turkey's rule the country."

"That's probably just tabloid journalism…"

There was another stretch of silence.

"Uh, anyway, thanks for going. It would've sucked seeing it by myself."

Eileen nodded and unbuckled her seatbelt, "Thanks for asking. It got me away from the apartment for awhile."

"Don't worry about it, I'm sure things'll get better soon."

Eileen had opened the door, but pulled it closed, "You mind if I ask you something?"

Mordecai blinked for a moment, "No, what is it?"

"Do you think it's worth trying anymore?"

"Huh?"

She spent a moment thinking about what she said before she answered, "Well, Margaret really hasn't caught the hint that you like her, and Rigby is a jerk anyway you say it, but what I meant was, do you think it's worth chasing after them when there's a whole world full of people that we still haven't met? Like, what if there's the possibility of finding someone better than who we like?"

Mordecai began to say something but stopped suddenly. He looked over the steering wheel, as if there was an answer in it's scuffed and worn exterior.

At length, he shifted back into drive and held his foot on the brake, "Thanks again for going, i'll see you around."

Eileen nodded and opened the door again, "Sorry, it's just been on my mind a lot lately."

"It's okay. I just wasn't expecting it is all."

"See ya."

He waited until she was inside before he left. As he drove off, he leaned against the door and contemplated what he was asked. It wasn't the question that scared him, but more the answer to it.

The sound of beeping startled him out of his thoughts and brought his attention to the instrument panel. A light with the symbol of a gas pump started beeping as the fuel gauge reached nearly empty.

He sighed, "That's an easier question to answer."

**[][][]**

He pulled to a stop at the pumps outside the AM/PM and shut off the engine. He walked to the gas pump and swiped the gas card Skips had given him and began to fill the tank.

Leaning against the truck, he glanced toward the building and seen two shaggy haired heads slowly peak up from behind the window.

Waving caused them to quickly disappear below the wall.

With a shrug, he waited for the machine to beep before replacing the nozzle.

After twisting on the cap and closing the fuel door, he jumped back behind the wheel and started the engine. The fuel gauge rose quickly back to the full mark.

Nodding out of approval, he drove to the exit and waited for the police cruiser to enter the lot before he drove back to the house.

Instead of the vacant lot he was expecting, it was occupied by Muscle Man, Fives, and Skips crouched around the smoking cart.

"Hey, what's going on?"

Everyone looked in his direction when he ran over.

"Cart's busted bro," Muscle Man said with a shake of his head, "Drove here to get Skips and it started smoking."

Mordecai sniffed the air, "Aww, man, what's that smell?"

Skips stood up and wiped his forehead, "The batteries are boiling. The regulator shorted out and started overcharging them."

"Can you fix it?" asked Fives, a note of worry hanging in his voice.

"Of course I can, but it needs a new regulator, and without one it isn't going anywhere tonight."

Muscle Man threw his hands up and ran to a nearby tree, "Lame! Bro's night is ruined!"

Gripping the tree, he proceeded to squeal and shake it until it snapped at the trunk. He held his weapon over his head and charged at the cart.

"Whoah, hold on!" Mordecai yelled, causing him to stop in his tracks, "We can take the truck, it's running fine."

Skips nodded, "That's not a bad idea. We'd get there faster than if we took the cart, anyway!"

"Bro's night is back on!" Fives cheered.

Muscle Man lost his grip on the tree, causing it to crush him into the ground.

From under the tree trunk, Muscle Man's arm raised up in a fist and the faint sound of 'Whoop!' could be heard.

**[][][]**

"So, how much longer until we get there?"

Skips pointed to a road they approached, "Turn here. Not much longer, we should be getting close."

Mordecai followed the instructions, "So, where'd you guys hear about this place?"

"This place was posted all over the internet! Tonight's the grand opening!" Fives yelled from the backseat.

"This gonna be awesome!" Muscle Man added while he began thrashing, causing the car to veer across the road.

"Whoa, chill out! It wouldn't be fun if we got killed on the way there!"

"I can't help it, bro, I've been looking forward to this all month!"

Mordecai looked in the mirror, "Hey, where'd he go?"

There was a loud thump on the roof as another muffled 'Whoop' started.

"Should've known."

"We're here!"

When the building came into view the sight nearly took his breath.

The large parking lot was lit by large flood lights attached to the end of thick poles that stretched far into the air. It was filled to the edges with customized hot rods and street cars. As they pulled in, a small foreign car and a large muscle car sped from the lot and raced down the road, side by side at rapidly increasing speeds.

There were so many people that they had trouble maneuvering the narrow aisles.

They finally found an open spot next to a large Japanese sedan that was painted a metallic silver-flake with blue racing stripes down the middle and checkered flag stripes down the side.

Mordecai shut the engine off and they exited the truck.

"Pop the hood," Skips said before he closed the door.

Mordecai obeyed and walked to the front.

Skips raised it and set the prop rod, sending the light dancing over the clean and shiny engine.

He pointed to the steel box raised off the ground beside their spot, "At some car shows, people will leave you money if they like your car."

Muscle Man jumped from the roof and landed between them, "Whoo! Let's get inside!"

"I'll catch up to you later," Skips said as he started down the aisle, "I'm gonna check out the cars first."

Mordecai nodded and hurried to catch up to Muscle Man and Fives.

The building was completely different than the parking lot made you think. At one point in it's past it used to be a large barn, but now was renovated into a building used for partying. It's name, 'Anarchy' was painted in large, red letters over the doors. The windows were shattered and shown blue and green lights on swivels, a sign of the party inside.

When they opened the door, the rush of loud music nearly knocking him backwards. The source was a group of musicians on a platform raised off the ground, their speakers and instruments occupying most of the space.

And there were people everywhere! So many, that it made the group outside look just like that, a group.

He was sure the fire marshal would have something to say about it, but he followed in the wake of Muscle Man as him and Fives forced their way to an open table.

"This place is off the hook!" Fives yelled from their vantage point.

From where they were sitting, the music on the stage was almost enough to cause total hearing loss. The musicians were all banging their heads, causing their hair to swirl around them. The only thing you could notice was that they were shirtless.

The song ended, and the crowd cheered.

"Thank you, that was our newest song, Song 4!"

Mordecai remembered him immediately as the kid from the DMV. Martin, was it?

"This song is called, 'Last Song Kills Audience', and it will be our last song. Enjoy!"

Everyone cheered again, louder than before, even though they just promised this song would kill them…

The guitarist stepped backward and started them off, the drummer and bassist following the lead they were given.

Mordecai saw everyone dancing and thought to himself that it was all just an accident away from a full scale figh.

"What do you think, bro?" Muscle Man asked, yelling to be heard over the music.

Mordecai looked across the table a moment and back to the crowd, "It's insane! I don't think I've ever seen this many people in one place before!"

Muscle Man nodded, "I know! This is primetime party-ing! I'm so pumped!"

Fives moved closer to Mordecai and whispered, "We have to keep an eye on him. If he gets too crazy, we gotta get him out of here."

Mordecai nodded and turned back to the crowd.

**[][][]**

CJ ran into her apartment and tossed her bag onto the table. Pulling her dead cell phone from her pocket, she quickly plugged it into the charger and waited for it to turn on.

'Come on, come on!'

The screen flashed a welcome message, followed by a low battery warning. Hitting ignore, she scrolled to her messages and began typing. After three minutes of typing, she selected Mordecai's number and began to hit the send button.

Something stopped her, though. Maybe it was Thomas asking her to keep it a secret, maybe it was realizing it was a horrible thing to find out through a text message.

She sighed, deciding to follow her better judgment and deleted the message. Instead of the long, explanation she had planned, she typed a new, shorter message.

'Mordecai, I need to talk to you. Important. CJ.'

This time, she hit send and tossed her phone onto the table and sighed.

She told herself she was doing this for him.

Whether it hurt him or not, he had the right to know.

Didn't he?

**[][][]**

Mordecai stepped outside to get away from the riot that had started and raised his ringing phone. The screen read a number he was familiar with, but still dreaded seeing.

After fighting the urge to ignore it, he hit answer.

"Hello?"

Even outside, the noise was loud enough to keep him from hearing the person on the other line.

"I can't hear you, you'll have to speak up!"

The voice became louder, but still remained unintelligible.

"Look, I'll have to talk to you some other time. I can't hear a thing."

The voice understood and hung up.

He lowered the phone and seen the prompt, 'New Message.'

He read the message from CJ and responded, "Okay, how about at the diner by the park tomorrow at 1:30?"

Mordecai clicked send and returned his phone to his pocket when he heard familiar squealing.

A shirtless Muscle Man was handcuffed and being drug through the doors of the building toward the nearby police car.

"They got me, bro! Tell Benson I might be late tomorrow!"

As he was thrown into the back seat, people nearby started cheering and clapping as the car drove away.

With a sigh, Mordecai shook his head and walked back to the truck to wait on those who weren't arrested.

When he returned, though, the first thing he noticed was the box. It was so full of money that it was sticking out of the slot. Opening the lid, he began to stack it together in disbelief.

"Not too bad for a first timer," Martin said from beside him as he set his guitar bag into the backseat of the car.

Mordecai shook his head, "All this because they liked the truck?!"

Martin smiled and nodded, "Yeah. You'd be amazed what you could make at these things."

A quick count of the stack shown he had close to ninety dollars for just three hours of doing nothing.

"If I'd known you were gonna be here, I'd have had you come up on stage and sing," Martin said as he emptied his own box.

Mordecai laughed, "I told you, that was all just a joke."

"Come on, you can't say you didn't enjoy it. It's just like karaoke, but better."

Skips closed the hood of the truck, "I think it's about time to go."

"Muscle Man got arrested, and they're gonna call in crowd control." Fives said as he floated into the backseat.

Mordecai looked at the money in his hand and sighed, "I guess we should go bail him out…"

**[][][]**

The light from the rising sun was amplified through the windshield, waking up the sleeping Mordecai. As he stirred, it took him a minute to realize where he was. The truck was parked outside of the house, but for whatever reason he'd fallen asleep before he could make it inside.

He yawned loudly and looked through the window where Muscle Man was asleep on the ground.

He unbuckled his seat belt and opened the door, somehow finding the strength to walk. The ringing of his phone startled him at first, but he managed to answer it.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Mordecai! How're you doing? You weren't sleeping, were you?"

He yawned and shook his head, "Not really, ma."

"Oh, good. You sounded busy last night, so I figured I'd try again."

"Alright. What'd you need?"

"Well," she began, "I just wanted to ask if you'd like to come in for your sister's birthday. She's been asking when you'd come back, and I thought this would be a good surprise."

Mordecai yawned again, and contemplated if he really wanted to. It would, after all, mean he'd have to deal with his father again.

"I'd have to see if I can get time off from work, but yeah, that'd be great." he answered, forcing himself to sound excited.

"Okay! Thanks, dear, I'm sure she'd be thrilled! Anyway, I'll let you get back to whatever you were doing, give me a call when you find anything out. See you soon!"

Mordecai hung up and read the, 'Battery low' message before returning the phone to his pocket.

He figured he had another two hours of sleep before he had to get ready for work and hoped that'd be long enough to charge it.

**[][][]**

Mordecai wiped the sweat from his forehead and replaced his hat. He looked over the leaves he'd raked, and the ones Rigby hadn't.

"Dude, rake the leaves!"

Rigby stretched from where he was leaning against the tree, "I'll get to them! I'm just resting."

Mordecai shook his head, "You've done nothing but rest! If Benson comes by here, he'll blow a gasket and I'm getting tired of sticking up for you."

Rigby yawned, "Since when did Benson make you my supervisor? I told you I'll get to them, and I will. Just not right this moment."

Mordecai looked at his watch and seen it was almost time for him to meet CJ.

He sighed and dropped his rake, "Whatever, just have your half done by the time I get back."

As he walked toward the entrance to the park, he switched to Benson's channel on his walkie.

"Hey, Benson, I'm going on my lunch break."

The static was interrupted moments later, "All right, just make sure the leaves are done by tonight."

"Will do."

By the time he made it to the diner, CJ was already waiting for him. As he walked in, both her and Eileen were locked in a death stare.

"Uh, hey. What's going on?"

"Nothing, just having a chat with Eileen. Let's get a table."

The tone of her voice told him that they were arguing over something serious.

Mordecai noticed as he passed the counter that Eileen avoided making eye contact with him. A sign that this wasn't going to be a good conversation.

* * *

Thanks for reading. Hope someone got the reference.


	6. (5) Pardon Me

Sorry this one took so long. I'll just say it started with 'Hey, watch this' and left me not being able to type well, but now I should be able to get this finished.

This and the next are gonna be the chapters that changes everything for the remainder of the story, thus I wanted the opening song for this one to be really good and spent nearly two hours sorting through my iTunes. I already have the one for the next chapter ready.

Also, if you want to synch up some great music to listen to while reading the video game part, play the Kingdom Hearts remake by 331erock. It's worth doing. I think you all know where to search for it.

* * *

**Chapter 4: Pardon Me?**

"_A decade ago, I never thought I would be at twenty three  
__On the verge of spontaneous combustion, woe is me  
But I guess that it comes with the territory  
An ominous landscape of never ending calamity  
I need you to hear, I need you to see  
That I have had all I can take  
And exploding seems like a definite possibility  
T__o me_

_So pardon me while I burst, into flames  
I've had enough of the world and it's people's mindless games  
So pardon me while I burn and rise above the flame  
Pardon me, pardon me, _

_Ill never be the same_"

- Incubus

* * *

"So?" Mordecai asked after the fifth minute of silence passed.

CJ looked up, having forgot that there was someone across from her, "What?"

"Well, you said there was something important you had to tell me."

She blinked for a moment, "Oh, that's right."

Her gaze dropped back to her glass, a sign of more silence about to come.

'_Well, I have to go through with it. I mean, we're here already. If I keep talking to myself he's gonna think something's wrong.'_

Mordecai sighed and finished his coffee.

'And Eileen at the counter, giving me the death stare. Why would she keep this from him? You'd think she would-'

She had been so focused on her thoughts she missed the question she was asked, "Sorry, what'd you say?"

"I asked if you'd mind going somewhere with me. I have to run an errand before I go back to work and I could use your help."

"Oh, uh, sure, that'd be great."

Mordecai nodded and left money on the table, "And we could talk about whatever you wanted to along the way."

"Right," she said, her voice sounding as if it came from someone else.

She avoided Eileen's glare as they left, slowly losing her nerve while questioning her reason for doing so. Concern, or jealousy?

**[][][]**

Rigby raked the last bit of leaves into his pile and nodded, "There, that's the last of them."

As if punishing his prior laziness, the wind increased, scattering the leaves from both his pile and Mordecai's.

He stared at mess as if his death glare would somehow convince them to return.

With more work in front of him, he mumbled as he began raking for the second time.

Working at his own pace, it wasn't long before he had gathered up his half. Whether it was guilt or the fact that Mordecai continued to stick up for him while he dealt with the aftermath of his late nights, he continued to rake his half of the leaves.

He soon realized both answers were one in the same. He couldn't admit to Mordecai the reason he was absent so much, and it made it that much harder to be around.

But whatever. That is the power of love.

As he finished the pile his phone began ringing.

'He doesn't even know I bought a cell phone,' he thought as he checked the number.

It was the only one he'd programmed in.

Contemplating letting it go, he hesitated before answering.

"Hey."

"Hey, what's up?"

He picked up Mordecai's rake and drug it beside the lawn mower, "Work. Nothing exciting."

The voice laughed, "Yeah, I know that feeling. Lucked out and got the day off. What do you have planned for tonight?"

He sat in the seat of the mower, his mind arguing with itself, attempting to decide the correct answer, "I thought I'd see what Mordecai had planned. It's been awhile since we just hung around, and everything."

"Oh."

He sat in the silence for a moment, "Is that alright? I mean, did you already plan something?"

"No, it's fine. That zombie movie came to theaters today, but we can go see it some other time. It's not a big deal."

"Okay then, we'll go see it this weekend." he said, glancing behind him to where he heard the sound of the cart.

"Benson's coming, I gotta go."

"Oh, okay. Talk to you later."

He quickly snapped the phone closed and dropped it in his pocket right as Benson pulled to a stop beside him.

"Go over the leaves with the mower, it looks like it's getting ready to storm."

Rigby nodded, "Was just getting ready to do it."

Benson nodded and started driving off, "Don't forget to turn on the mulcher. Otherwise, we'll have leave bits all over the soccer field."

"What does he think I am, an idiot?"

He turned the key for the mower and started driving toward the leaf piles, obviously forgetting to activate the mulcher.

**[][][]**

"Thanks for helping, I probably would have picked the first thing I saw," Mordecai said as they walked through the Twin Peaks mall, "I'm not that great at shopping for women."

"No problem," CJ said as she looked at the stores they passed, "What does she like?"

He had think for a moment, "I really don't know. It's been so long since I seen her, there's no telling what she's into now."

"Really? How long has it been?"

"It'd have to be since I left home, so maybe three years," he answered, stopping to look through the window of a store that caught his attention.

"That long? You haven't been back since?"

He shook his head, "Let's go in here. Me and my dad had some… heated words the day before I left. Didn't think I'd be welcome back, but I got the call this morning so I'm just hoping everything goes well."

Signs were hung around the store promising Circuit Shack was the only place they needed to shop. Despite the small interior of the store, they seemed to have quite a selection.

"So, what was the old town like?" she asked, keeping conversation away from what she wanted to talk about.

He sighed, "Man, it was great! It was by the sea, and there were cliffs that you could sit at and watch the boats roll into the harbor. There was 'The Nail', a gap in the rocks that people used to jump over. I remember Richard dared Rigby to jump it once. He tripped and landed face first in the water."

"So, Rigby lived in the same town?"

Mordecai picked up one of the MP3 players and started scrolling through the menu, "Yeah, we hung out since we were kids. In the summer we'd sneak into the theater on the main drag and watch movies all day. Then there was the arcade, the beach, and there was a park right in the middle of the town, kinda like where I live now. Only difference was that one had more of a forest."

"Sounds perfect."

Mordecai continued, caught up in his past, "It was. Then the night I left he came with. His parents never really cared what he did so I doubt they noticed he left. Maybe I should just get her a gift card."

Cj laughed and gave him a shove, "What're you, her uncle?"

He laughed back, "You're right. Besides, I don't think they have any of these stores out there."

"So, what do you remember?"

"Well," he began, walking to a shelf of video cameras, "When we were kids she used to always make movies."

She nodded, "Alright, that's a start. What kind of camera did she have?"

"One of those big ones that took VHS."

"And if there isn't any stores like this around there, she probably still has it."

The section was literally filled with cameras, every one of them different than the last.

"What kind should I get? I mean, I don't even know the difference between them," he said, at a loss.

"That's a shock. You seem like you'd known all about electronics."

He picked up one of the demo models and turned it over, "If it doesn't have a controller plugged into it, I'm clueless."

She nodded, "That I believe."

"By the way," he said as he picked up another, "What was it you wanted to talk about?"

"Nothing important."

**[][][]**

"Dude, pick up the axe!" Mordecai yelled while mashing the buttons on the arcade machine.

Rigby's character ran to the axe while avoiding the flames that fell from the ceiling of the room they were in, "Now what?!"

Mordecai's character finished putting out the flames on his side and ran to pick up another fire extinguisher.

"Okay, start knocking down the door to the next level."

The health bar over the door only moved a sliver each time he hit it, "It's not working!"

"No, you have to use the combo!"

Rigby looked down at the controls, "What was the combo?"

Mordecai kept putting out the fires, "Down, down, left, down, right, up, down, while holding the punch button."

He tried again, "It's not working!"

With all the fires put out, Mordecai ran and grabbed a second axe, "You're holding kick. I'll get it."

Mordecai's character began glowing as he swung the axe behind him. The instant he hit the door, the health bar drained and the door disappeared.

"I almost had it," Rigby mumbled as they entered the next level.

Mordecai shook his head, "Not even close."

"Well, it's a new game! How am I supposed to know?"

"It uses the same combos as the first Xtreme Xcape, and you used to have those memorized."

"Whatever."

They moved through the level, defeating the low level fire demons as they picked up supplies for the boss battle.

Finally making it to the end, the screen went black as the cut-scene before the battle started.

"How great is this game?"

Rigby nodded, "I know! The characters actually talk now!"

"What in all of hair-city is that?!"

Afrowski shook his head, "That is what we like to call a class five on my pissed off meter."

The camera panned up to show a three story tall fire troll. He sat in the middle of the room, the flames from his body slowly catching everything around him on fire.

"So," Hairowitz began, "TSC?"

Afrowski grinned, "TSC."

A jagged line separated the screen diagonally as the video zoomed in on their faces, "Two Step Carnage!"

"You remember what to do?" Mordecai asked as the screen went blank.

Rigby began nodding, "Hmm, Hmm, you know it!"

"Hmm, Hmm, Let's do this!"

Instrumental music featuring an guitar and drums began to play. The guitar's speed was incredible, so fast that you had trouble believing it wasn't computer generated.

An animated fight sequence began as buttons began to pop up on each side of the screen.

Their movements were coordinated perfectly, completing each button sequence flawlessly.

The characters began dodging the burnt out spaces in the floor as they made their way toward the boss. Leaping and rolling, it wasn't long before they passed the first part.

"We got about a minute or so before the floor gives out!" Hairowitz yelled as the words, 'Approach, complete!' appeared.

"That's a minute more than we'll need."

The troll began to roar as he began to spit fire toward them.

As before, their button mashing caused the characters to dodge the flames and climb the walls. As they climbed, they began to gather the fire extinguishers that they passed.

The button mashing gave way to the prompt, 'You need four more extinguishers!'

Mordecai picked up another from his side, dropping the count to three.

"Come on, dude. Only three more."

Rigby blinked, "There's only one over here!"

Mordecai looked to his side of the screen, "Didn't you pick any up as we went through the other levels?"

"Was that what those were for?"

Mordecai sighed as the counter finished, "Dude! How're we gonna beat the boss now?!"

"It's fine," Rigby said, "How hard can it be?"

Another prompt appeared, 'Not enough extinguishers. Difficulty elevated to impossible.'

"That hard," Mordecai said with a sigh, "So instead of losing the game we have to continue even though it's impossible."

"It's just a game. There's always a way to win these."

A second prompt appeared, 'There is no way to win now.'

"Stop talking!"

"Let's just get this over with," Mordecai said as the fight began.

The characters, now holding fire extinguishers, were back to being under their full control. In between their health bars a timer started counting down from a minute.

Rigby started spraying the troll, but it's health bar only dropped a little bit.

Mordecai started helping, but it stayed about the same.

"This is hopeless."

Rigby pointed at the screen, "Hey, the flame on his head is blue! That must be what we need to hit!"

Mordecai looked at the timer, "Let's give it a shot."

They climbed up another floor until they were head level. They began spraying the blue flame, their attacks becoming more effective, but not enough. The troll began throwing flames, causing them to waste time by chasing them down.

"Above his head, is that a sprinkler?"

Rigby nodded, "That must be the secret! How do we turn it on?!"

"I think I know. How many extinguishers do you have left?"

Rigby checked his count, "Only one."

Mordecai switched to his axe, "I'm all out. When I tell you to, throw the extinguisher toward it."

Mordecai began spinning his joystick, causing Hairowitz to begin rotating with his axe in front of him. Having only one shot at winning, Rigby began climbing up the monster's head, causing Afrowski to begin losing health.

"Now!"

Rigby threw the extinguisher seconds before his character turned to ashes. When it neared the sprinkler, Mordecai slammed on the punch button, using the widely known glitch from the first game to throw the axe.

As Hairowitz began punching air, the axe flew and collided with the extinguisher, the resulting explosion causing the sprinkler to activate.

Afrowski respawned next to Hairowitz as the troll began shrinking until the screen went black.

Now in the final cutscene, the troll was shrunk until it was just a cinder. Hairowitz and Afrowski walked to where it sat and crouched.

"Looks like your reign of fire is over, hot stuff."

The troll growled in protest.

"Would you like to do the honors?" asked Afrowski.

Hairowitz stood up, "Why not?"

The camera switched views, now looking up at the heroes. Hairowitz raised his foot and stomped toward the screen, causing it to go black.

"Dude, we did it!"

They began shouting, jumping off their chairs and running in circle through the empty arcade.

The screen changed to the leader board, 'Mor' and 'Rig' flashing at the top of the team list. The clock on the machine read 12:33 A.M.

"That was amazing!" Mordecai yelled when they made it back to the machine, "Let's go again!"

From the front desk near the doors came the sound of a shotgun chambering a round, the owner being a little more than angry about waiting for two hours while they finished their game.

"Na, I think we better go."

**[][][]**

Martin shook his head and set his empty can on the bar at Anarchy, "No, man, C is this."

Mordecai moved his fingers on the neck of the guitar to match them with the placement of Martin's.

"Like this?"

He nodded, "Okay, do you remember the timing?"

Mordecai played the song over in his head until he was sure he remembered the tempo. He hummed the lyrics while he strummed the chord, _down, up, down, down._

He stopped, attempting to remember the next chord on his own.

After a moment, Martin showed him on his guitar, "G."

Mordecai adjusted and continued, same rhythm with that chord. He stopped, not knowing the rest of the song.

Martin nodded, "Good so far, just have to work on memory and rhythm. The rest are just power chords."

He adjusted his guitar and turned down the volume, his guitar already connected to the sound system for the building, and strummed while he sang the lyrics, _"I'm just a loser, learning to care for, this soul inside of me. I don't give my heart to no one, cause I, don't want to waste my time. I tried to love this loneliness to, slip out from where it hides."_

Mordecai nodded, "Sounds simple enough, but are you sure about the song?"

"Definitely, if you want to impress a woman, this is the one to use." Martin added while he changed the tuning.

"Hey, come on, man, we gotta get ready for the show!" came the voice of an annoyed sounding person he didn't know.

Martin waved toward the stage, "Alright, alright, keep your shirt on!"

The drummer started out a beat and the bassist followed, singing about how Martin was always late.

He quickly wrote down the chords and their progression on a napkin and handed I to Mordecai.

"Hang on to the acoustic, practice the chords and get the rhythm down. I've got me a bassist to kill."

The static from his walkie cut out for a moment, "Yeah, sounds like I got work to do."

**[][][]**

Mordecai parked the truck at the curb and took a few moments to gather his nerve. A minute of looking in the mirror was enough.

'Okay, got the flowers, got the song I recorded, and I'm lookin' good,' he thought as he rode the elevator to Margaret's floor.

The tension was tightening his chest to the point where he could barely walk. The doors opened and the hall seemed to stretch on forever, far beyond the constructional limits of the building. Each step he took felt as if the floor would rupture, sending him into an abyss of nervousness and emptiness that he couldn't even begin to comprehend.

Despite the appearance of the hallway, it wasn't long until he reached her door.

He brought his hand up but lacked the resolve to finish the movement.

Another moment of heavy breathing and he was ready. The moment of truth.

He knocked on the door and waited, the seconds ticking by in his imagination, each tick pounding in his chest.

The door opened and Eileen blinked, clearly not expecting him.

"Oh, uh, hey Eileen. Could I talk to Margaret real quick?"

"Well," she began, obviously trying to make up her mind, "She's watching a movie with her boyfriend."

"That's fine, it'll only be for a second."

Eileen spent the next thirty seconds looking between him and the floor, working up the courage to do what CJ couldn't.

"Look, there's something you need to see." she said, opening the door enough for him to see into the apartment.

On the couch in front of the TV, Margaret and her boyfriend were watching a movie.

All emotion left his body as they turned toward him.

"Rig-rigby? What're you doing here?"

* * *

Sigh, again, sorry it took too long. I got back into playing Conquer Online, and i've had trouble getting away from it. I'm gonna put my server and name in my profile if you play it or want to start out, i can help with leveling up.

Anyway, I was trying to decide if I should hold off on this part of the story and add some filler material before it, or get it out of the way and make the story revolve around their resolution.

I chose the latter, but that's something we won't discuss right now.

Anyway, thanks for reading, I hope you aren't too disappointed with the cliffhanger I left.


	7. (6) Found Out About You (Part 1)

Alright, back again. Sorry it's no longer a weekly updated story, behind with others that need done, and i'm writing for a few new genres as well.

Anyway, picking up from the cliffhanger.

EDIT: Figured i'd answer one of the reviews to clarify things. It may become MordXOC later on, but it definitely won't be Martin if that's what you're thinking. The scene in this chapter with him is just to set up his carefree personality and to more explain his duality later on.

* * *

**Chapter 6: Found Out About You (Part 1)**

"_All last summer, in case you don't recall  
__I was yours, and you were mine  
__Forget it all  
_

_Is there a line that I could write  
__That's sad enough to make you cry  
__All the lines you wrote to me were lies  
__Months roll past, the love that you struck dead  
__Did you love me, only in my head?_

_Things you said and did to me  
__Seemed to come so easily  
__The love I thought I'd won, you give for free_

_Whispers at the bus stop  
__I've heard about nights in the schoolyard_

_I found out about you."_

- The Gin Blossoms

**[][][]**

His face was emotionless, nothing on his mind but the road in front of him. The revving of the engine was deafening, but he shown no sign of slowing down.

50... 56... 63...

He increased the pressure on the throttle, the powerful engine causing the wheels to spin, even at this high of speed.

88... 101...

In the mirror, the flash of a light told him the traffic camera triggered as he passed the red light. Not that it managed to catch him on film.

115... 125... 133...

Not knowing where he was, or even where he was going, he kept the pedal held. The engine was protesting, a sign that he was reaching the limit. He slammed it the rest of the way and pushed the button for overdrive.

140... 142... 144...

His headlights were brighter than anything he'd ever seen, the symptom of an overcharging alternator. However, they managed to show a line of trees ahead, having left the pavement long ago.

146... 147... 148...

The needle of the speedometer had long ago stopped showing numbers, and now rested against the blocking pin. The trees didn't move. Mostly because they're trees, and they don't move. Snapping out of his trance, Mordecai slammed on the brakes and struggled to keep from losing control.

150... 133... 117...

The road curved left before the trees, however, the rear end of the truck began to shift toward the inside of the corner.

77... 63... 49...

Still too fast. Not knowing what else to do, he cut the wheel and slammed on the gas.

The rear end swung around and he entered the corner in a slide. He held the wheel, suddenly realizing how much easier the cart was to handle. The truck followed the corner, it's driver side tires slowly lifting off the ground.

Now at the end of the corner, he began to straighten the wheel, the fishtailing of the rear end being easier to control than the entire truck.

Holding steady at thirty-five, he attempted to breathe, knowing it would take awhile. The engine rumbled quietly, happy to return to it's normal RPM.

He shook his head and looked in the mirror, making sure that he really survived it and this wasn't a dying hallucination.

The beeping of the gas gauge sounded like a bomb going off inside his head.

Once finding a big enough area, he turned around, this time keeping well under the speed limit.

**[][][]**

Word travels fast, and by the morning, Benson had already caught wind of what happened.

What started as Pops' calling Thomas when Mordecai didn't return to the house, turned into a manhunt of phone calls, trying to find out where he was.

Thomas had been growing more and more nervous from covering for Rigby that he finally reached his limit and told Pops' what was going on. From there came Skips, who started by asking Rigby where he went. It took all of his patience to remain calm, but Skips managed to keep from blowing up.

After an hour of phone and walkie tag, Benson was called. He was… less than excited about being woken up, but helped where he could.

Eventually they decided that he needed some time to himself.

So now, ten minutes after work started, Benson was knocking on the door.

"Come on, Mordecai, get up! We're not doing this again!"

He sighed loudly and stopped his barrage on the door, "Look, I get that you may have liked this girl, but there's better ways to handle this."

He waited for an answer and tried the doorknob, finding it locked, "Come on, some work will take your mind off of everything."

He was startled by the loud yawn that came from the end of the hallway.

Mordecai stretched and fumbled the door keys from his pocket, "Oh, hey Benson. Sorry I'm late today."

Benson stepped aside, surprised at his level of normalcy compared to the last time, "It's… alright."

Mordecai pushed the door open and yawned again, "I'm just gonna grab a quick shower then I'll be good to go."

Benson nodded, "Take your time. I'll be outside when you're done."

**[][][]**

Rigby knocked on the wall of the garage to get Skips' attention, "Skips', the lawn mower quit running."

"I'll look at it later."

Rigby turned to leave but stopped, "Hey, about last night…"

Skips tossed a wrench to the side and grabbed another, "I thought long and hard about it, and I think I'd like to stay out of this one. However, if you want my two cents, I think it was a terrible thing to do."

"Yeah, but-"

"I don't wanna hear it. I'm staying out of it. I'll fix the mower, in the meantime use the push one."

Rigby turned around and began the walk to the shed, mumbling how he hated the push mower.

**[][][]**

Mordecai pulled the door closed behind him and slid on his baseball cap. As promised, Benson was waiting, leaning against the front of the truck with his arms folded.

"Sorry about that."

Benson nodded, "It's alright."

"So, what's my assignment for today?" Mordecai asked, hoping some work would keep his mind occupied.

He motioned toward the truck, "We need to go to the lawn store and get something for the mower."

Happy that it would include more driving, he climbed behind the wheel.

Benson held off the conversation until they were well on the highway.

"So, how's it holding up?"

Mordecai shrugged, "Everything seems alright. Not that great on gas, and the headlights tend to get brighter every now and then."

He nodded, "Yeah, an engine that big is always gonna be bad on gas. The headlights is probably the alternator."

"What's that?"

"Well," he began, trying to think of how to explain it, "It uses the power of the engine to charge the battery and use the headlights and stuff like that. When it's going bad, it either overcharges or doesn't at all. When it quits, the battery will try to run everything until it's dead, then it'll leave you stranded somewhere."

"So, how do we know when it goes bad?"

Benson looked behind the steering wheel, "When the engine's running on the battery a light will pop on. That's the easiest way to tell."

"Maybe I should order one. Just in case."

"That'd be the smart thing to do. Definitely if you're still planning on going out of town. Stop by the shop on the way home and I'll show you which to get."

Mordecai shrugged, "I'm not so sure about going now."

"I think it's a good idea. Instead of staying Friday night, why not stay all weekend and leave Monday?"

"You think so?"

"Yeah," Benson said, leaning against the door, "You've been working a lot lately. Some time off is just what you need right now."

Mordecai didn't say anything for a moment, "This the next turn?"

"Yeah."

He hit the turn signal and merged into the lane for their exit.

"You know, between you and Rigby. I can't say I'm not surprised. He may be a lazy bum, but I never thought he'd stoop that low."

"It's not a big deal."

"What I'm trying to say," Benson started, having trouble finishing his thought, "If you ever need to… You know."

Mordecai did his best to fake a smile, "Yeah, I get it. Thanks."

**[][][]**

"This apartment consists of nearly half the entire fourth floor," the man said as he opened the door and stepped aside for Mordecai to enter.

As Mordecai walked around, he began reading the features and information from the listing, "Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a full kitchen, and a sunken lounge area."

The place was huge. Hardwood floors everywhere except the kitchen and lounge area, which appeared to have new tile and carpet. Along the back wall was the kitchen, a new-ish refrigerator and stove were lined up with the cabinets and sink.

The lounge area was sunken as the man had said, and had a custom sofa built into the circular steps across from a large TV. The windows beside it looked as if they were just replaced.

Other than that, the apartment was empty. All the rooms were bare, lacking beds and even dressers. But still, the place wasn't bad.

The bedrooms were lined together along the wall beside the kitchen, leaving a good ten by twenty space for whatever else.

"- which the building is right on the outskirts of the city, so it's rather quiet around here."

"Not for long," Mordecai said quietly.

"Pardon?"

"Nothing. So, what does it cost a month to rent?"

The man chuckled slightly, "First time buyer?"

"That noticeable?"

"This is a little different from renting. What you do in this case is buy the apartment then pay for the utilities. Electricity, water, stuff like that."

"That is different," Mordecai said, turning toward the door as Martin walked in.

"What'd you think, honey?"

Mordecai laughed nervously, "What're you talking about?"

The realtor's expression shown confusion, but he tried his best to maintain a professional demeanor, "So, if you'd like, Mr. Light, I can show you the-"

Martin shook his head, "Nah, that's alright. I'll take it."

Mordecai now shared the realtor's confusion, "Are you sure?"

He nodded, "Yup, it's got everything I want."

"But you didn't even look at it."

"I'll have everything transferred to the account, and we'll go from there."

The realtor realized he wasn't joking and was ecstatic, "Wonderful! That's great news! I'll contact a notary and we could sign the deed this weekend."

Martin smiled, "That'd be great. See you then."

They left the apartment, quiet until the elevator doors closed.

"Okay, you didn't look at anything, but it has everything?"

The grin never left his face, "I know, it's great, isn't it?"

"I don't get it."

"Come take a look."

They left the elevator and started walking along the parking lot, Mordecai attempting to understand the mind of Martin Light.

They eventually came to a row of large doors similar to that on a barn. He swung them open and pushed them into the opening in the wall.

He flipped the light switch and it was then that he realized what he meant, and he started chuckling.

"Isn't it perfect?"

Behind the doors was a large, two and a half car garage, complete with a sparkling black and white tile floor. Along the edges were spaces for tools and equipment with a large bench running along the entire back wall.

"This is the reason you bought the apartment?"

He nodded, his eyes glinting in the sun, "I plan to spend more time here than the apartment, anyway."

Mordecai sighed, "You and Skips have too much in common."

**[][][]**

Martin leaned against the door of the truck as Mordecai signaled for an upcoming turn.

"Hey, Mordecai, do me a favor."

He nodded, "Sure."

"After this corner, punch the gas."

"What?" he asked, blinking.

Martin sat up in his seat, "Hit the gas. I wanna see something."

"Alright."

As soon as Mordecai straightened the wheel, he pushed the pedal as far as it'd go. The engine revved loudly as they launched forward. It seemed the same as usual, but Martin shook his head and started laughing.

"What? That's great for a truck, isn't it?"

"That's not why I'm laughing," he said, "I'm laughing because someone governed the engine."

Mordecai hit the brakes to stop for the light, "Yeah, I don't know what that means."

"Tsk, tsk. I keep forgetting. It means that somebody messed with the engine to keep it from reaching it's full potential."

Mordecai didn't know what to think. It was fast, how could it not be running on everything it has.

"I'm sure they had a reason, but I could tell by the way it takes off. Sure it spins the tires, but it should be doing a lot more."

He pulled into the parking lot and stopped beside Martin's car, "I don't know. It's too fast for that to be true."

Martin shrugged, "Anyway, thanks for going with me to look at that place."

"No problem."

He shut the door and watched the truck pull away.

"No," he said, rubbing his hand on the trunk of his own car, remembering how destroyed the rear end was from the accident with the truck that hit his father, "Couldn't be the Black Tear."

He opened his door and fell into the seat, knowing full well it was.

"We better get ready."

**[][][]**

Skips was leaning against the fender of the truck, watching as Mordecai finished putting in the alternator.

"Alright, now tighten the bolts for the wires, and you're done."

Mordecai nodded, straining to make sure it was tight, "Okay, I think that's it."

Skips reached inside and started the engine, "Now, we can check and make sure it's working."

Mordecai stood back as Skips plugged some kind of device into the battery. After a moment he unplugged it.

"Yep, it's working."

"Oooohhh!" Mordecai yelled while he slammed the hood.

Benson walked out of the house, "How is it?"

"Running like a dream."

"Check the oil?"

Mordecai nodded, "Just added a quart."

"Anti-freeze?"

Mordecai held up a large jug of water, "Full, but I got this just in case."

"Headlight fluid?"

Mordecai sighed, "No, I forgot to check that."

Skips tried his best to keep from laughing but couldn't help it.

Benson laughed as well, "There is no such thing as headlight fluid."

Mordecai nodded, "Alright, you got me."

"Well, I guess that's everything."

He nodded and picked his backpack off the ground, "Yeah, guess so."

"If anything happens, let me or Skips know."

"Will do."

Mordecai nodded and climbed behind the wheel. He tossed his bag into the passenger seat and dropped into drive, watching the park house disappear in the rearview mirror.

Before heading out of town, he decided to stop at the diner.

"Oh, hey Mordecai."

"Hey, Eileen," he said as he reached the counter, "I just need a coffee to go."

"To go?"

He nodded, "Yeah, going back home for the weekend. Just need something to keep me awake on the drive."

"Okay, just one second."

She came back a moment later with a large, plastic mug with a screw on lid, "Here. Just so you don't spill it or anything."

"Thanks. How much?"

She waved her hands, "Don't worry about it. On the house."

"Awesome, thanks."

"Look," she began, sorry to bring it up, "I know the way you found out probably wasn't the best, and I shouldn't have kept it from you."

"It's not a big deal," he lied, not wanting to have this conversation before he left.

"Is it?"

The words seemed to hang in the air, neither one of them apologizing for it.

"Mordecai! You didn't leave yet" Martin said as he walked to register and gave him a shove, "You didn't say goodbye."

"Ha, it's just for the weekend."

Martin glanced over the counter, "I'm not interrupting anything?"

Mordecai shook his head, "No, Eileen this is Martin. Martin, Eileen."

He nodded, "A pleasure."

"Likewise."

"Anyway," he said, taking a CD case from his pocket, "I felt you deserved to borrow my long drive mix. Guaranteed to help pass the time."

Mordecai took the CD, "Thanks, I'll give it to you when I get back."

"Believe me, you're gonna love it," Martin said with a grin, knowing the real reason he gave it to him.

* * *

There you have it. Next we have what happens on the trip, more about Rigby, and Martin's reason to giving him the CD.

Sorry again that it took so long. I'm swamped at the moment and will definitely put more time into the next one.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it.


	8. (7) Small Town

Alright guys, back again.

A lot's happened in the past couple weeks.

Breaking Bad ended. Not happy that it's over, but it was a great series.

Rented GTA V, so I spent my time playing that to make sure I got my money's worth.

I started searching my Itunes to see what lyrics I wanted to use for the opening, and it took me awhile, but I decided Jonathan Coulton fits this story better than anything else, but this song matched perfectly.

Also, I wanted to give everyone reading a chance to weigh in on something that someone brought up.

I had been toying with the idea of it being MordXOC since I started, but hadn't really considered it until recently. So, I want to ask what you'd think about it being MXOC or keeping it canon. I have a plot for each decision

We'll discuss that later on, for now, there's a chapter ready to be read.

So, let's get to it, shall we?

* * *

**Chapter 7: Small Town**

_Well I was born in a small town  
And I live in a small town  
Prob'ly die in a small town  
Oh, those small communities_

_All my friends are so small town_  
_My parents live in the same small town_  
_My job is so small town_  
_Provides little opportunity_

-John Cougar Mellencamp

**[][][]**

_I was fine._

The Black Tear rolled along the highway, the sound of the tires rolling on the asphalt and the roaring engine mixing together to create a silence that the sound of the radio seemed to echo inside.

_I pulled myself together, just in time. To throw myself away._

Mordecai leaned against the door, left arm on the rolled down window and hand at twelve o'clock on the steering wheel, the problems of the city gone, almost non-existent to him for the moment.

_Once, my perfect world was gone, I knew. You ruined everything, in the nicest way._

He reached over and tapped the volume button again, increasing the sound to the speakers. He couldn't help but nod along to the slow, ethereal rhythm of the song he'd already played four times.

_You should know. How great things were before you. Even so. They're better, still today._

He continued nodding, but glanced up at the directions he left hanging out of the sun visor and seen he still had another ten miles until his exit. His phone was sitting in the cup holder, and he resisted the urge to check his text messages and missed call. Instead, he flipped on the turn signal and merged to stop at the Oasis.

_I can't think of who I was, before. You ruined everything, in the nicest way._

As he pulled into the parking area outside of the building, he hit the back button so the song would play again when left.

Remembering to take his keys with him, he grabbed his phone and walked to the building.

He zipped up his jacket and walked to the vending machines, seeing only a few items not sold out, and bought an energy drink that promised to 'add some pep in his step.'

Not seeing anything else that caught his attention, he returned to the truck and climbed the bumper to sit on the edge of the hood.

For the number of times his phone rang, there wasn't anything really interesting. Four text messages from Muscle Man assuring him he was close to the top on his bro list. Typical message he'd received every day since he bailed him out of jail.

"Delete," he said quietly as he moved on.

Another missed call from an unknown number. The number had the same area code as the park's number, but he didn't recognize the rest. They'd called at least twice a day, but he never answered.

"Delete."

Missed call from mom, and a text message seconds after the call.

'Hi honey, how's the trip? Just wanted to check when you'd be here. Farrah's been sitting out front for the past hour. So, whatever. Let me know if anything comes up. And don't use your phone while you're driving. You'll put your eye out!'

He laughed at the joke, and looked at the picture she'd sent. It was one of the last pictures they'd took, and he remembered it being a couple months before he left. His mom and dad stood behind him and Farrah who were sitting on the park bench in front of them.

Farrah's feathers were just turning purple, and his own had just finished growing their white rings.

He remembered how similar they were, but how different at the same time. Red and blue. Dad and Mom.

'Ha ha, I'm almost there, about a half an hour.'

Closing the phone when he received the 'Message Sent' notice, he finished the rest of the drink and shivered.

'Man, that's strong.'

He tossed the can in trash, and slid back behind the wheel, hesitating before turning the key. He didn't know why he couldn't start the engine and continue driving. His heart was beating faster than usual, but he blamed that on the drink he just chugged.

Maybe he was subconsciously avoiding going home.

'Just keep driving. Pass the exit and go wherever you want. An hour later, call and say you missed the turn and got lost.'

Truth be told, he liked that idea. However, he shook it away and forced himself to continue.

After the engine started, it took a moment for the CD player to start.

Mordecai listened to the song play before sighing and hitting the next button.

**[][][]**

Rigby sighed and closed his phone, "No answer."

He absentmindedly twirled the rake in one hand while he contemplated giving it a second try. While he was focused on the phone, movement in the background caught his attention and he watched as several leaves swirled in the wind.

The renegade leaves caught a back draft and banked to the left, aiming directly for the pile he had already raked.

"Come on, join the others!"

The wind gave out, and they landed right on top of the pile. He began to throw his hands in the air to celebrate being finished, but a large gust of wind blew both piles across the field, ruining the last hour of work.

His jaw dropped, and he could do nothing but watch as they settled into their new place. While he stood motionlessly fuming over the amount of work he had left to do, more leaves began to fall from the trees.

"This is your fault!" he yelled, pointing the rake at the trees, "Everyday, I rake thousands of these things, and everyday more fall!"

He sprinted to the tree and began climbing the trunk. He reached the first limb and one by one began furiously ripping the leaves off from the branches.

"If I rip off every one of you, I won't have to rake again!" he laughed, becoming so entranced by his new goal that he began biting them as well.

He stopped when he seen the mother and her son staring at him curiously.

"Mommy, what's wrong with that man?"

The mother shook her head and quickly pulled him back the way they came, "I don't know, Billy, let's go. We can go to the park another day."

Rigby sighed and dropped back to the ground, not one bit happy at the work left to do.

With no excuse coming to mind, he began the second attempt.

"Stupid leaves," he mumbled, "This is all your fault."

The sound of a mechanical humming reached him, and he knew the sound was the cart. He quickened his pace as he watched the roof slowly appear over the hill before him. He managed to collect a decent sized pile before the cart stopped.

He turned as Muscle Man was walking towards him.

"Oh man am I glad to see you. I thought you were Benson for a minute."

Muscle Man walked past him and looked at the pile of leaves.

"Yeah, this is the second time I've had to rake them. The wind keeps-"

Muscle Man started kicking and walking through the pile until it was scattered into nothing.

"That should keep you busy," he said as he started back to the cart, "Wouldn't want you to steal any more girlfriends."

Rigby looked at the once more destroyed pile of leaves and turned to where Muscle Man was walking, "It's not like he was going out with her. She was fair game!"

Muscle Man dropped back into the cart and turned the key, "To anyone else she would've been, but you were his bro. You knew how he felt, that's why you were avoiding him, to avoid feeling guilty. Now, slither along snake, Benson's gonna be back soon."

The cart spun in circles before launching down the road leading to the house.

"You're the snake," he mumbled as he picked up the rake to start again.

**[][][]**

Lyle scrolled through his recent calls list as he leaned against Martin's garage door, "I hope something didn't happen."

His sister continued pacing, her face plagued by worry, "He would've called."

"Maybe his phone's broke. Or he left it in the Skyline."

Lyle ran across the lot to where he parked Martin's car and began looking to see if his phone was there.

"I knew this was a bad idea," he said as he searched, "We should of followed him."

Not seeing a phone, he sighed and carefully closed the door.

"Hey, Sarah, you have any missed calls?"

She stopped and as if she suddenly remembered she had a phone, she fumbled to pull it from her pocket.

"Nothing."

He sighed and walked back to the garage door, shaking his head.

They heard the car before they saw it. The engine revved loudly as if it was struggling to stay running. The sound from the exhaust promised there were several rust holes in the pipes. As he pulled into the parking lot, the engine hesitated and nearly quit, a bit of skillful throttle work, however, kept it from doing so.

One headlight worked, the other hung over the caved in bumper. The exterior seemed to be more rust than metal, with only a few spots of paint being visible. The passenger door was dented and caved in from a prior accident that most likely caused the rest of the damage to the body.

Martin parked it facing the garage door and a second later, the engine died. A turn of the key resulted in a faint click.

He sighed and pulled on the parking brake before he stepped out of the car, "Sorry for keeping you waiting."

"Meanie," Sarah pouted.

Lyle nodded, "You shoulda let us follow you. The thing doesn't even have front brakes!"

Martin smiled and looked over the car, "Yeah, she's a beauty, isn't she?"

Lyle shook his head, "What junkyard did this come from?"

"It was a salvage yard…"

"Not helping your argument," Sarah added while she looked over the car.

"Whatever," he said as he opened the garage doors, "Just help me push it in the garage."

Lyle and Martin walked to the back of it as Sarah opened the door to sit behind the wheel. As she put her foot in, it broke through the rotted floorboard, causing large fragments of metal to fall with it.

"Oops."

Martin shook his head, "It's not a big deal. Just steer it to keep it straight."

"Do you want me to-"

They began pushing, straining against the weight of the car. After several seconds, they stopped, panting from the work.

"Man, I know this thing isn't that heavy."

Martin leaned against the bumper, "I wish the brakes worked this good on the way here."

The idea hit him, and he looked through the back window. He started laughing and ended with a sigh.

"What?"

"Sarah," Martin began, "Take off the parking brake."

"That's what I tried to say," she yelled as she threw the level down.

The car rocked backwards slightly.

Lyle shook his head, "I hate you."

This time, their effort was rewarded and the car rolled into the garage at a quick pace.

"Okay, pull on the lever!"

"What'd you say?" she asked.

The car rolled into the bench and bounced backwards, leaving the front bumper behind.

Lyle threw his hands into the air and walked out of the garage.

Martin walked to the front and checked the damage to the bench.

"Sorry…"

He shrugged, "It was coming off anyway."

Lyle walked inside, "What is this thing even called?"

"Acura. Japanese luxury."

"Second question, why is it here?"

Martin smiled and looked it over, "This is my ace in the hole."

"Don't tell me this is about the Black Tear," Lyle said with a sigh.

He nodded, "Afraid so."

"There's no way the Black Tear is still around. Even so, what are you hoping to achieve?" Lyle said as he kicked the quarter panel, causing a hole to appear.

"Revenge."

"Are you positive that it's what you say it is?" Sarah asked, trying to be the voice of reason.

"I won't know until it's back in town," he said, walking to the back of the car, "The guy who owned it had a custom control module built. If the readings on the module come back as the same in the Black Tear I'll know."

**[][][]**

Farrah sighed and looked at her new watch. She continued leaning against the railing for the deck, watching the cars pass the house.

Her mother looked out of the storm door, "Still not here?"

She shook her head, "No."

The sound of a car door caught her attention and she looked to where her dad was walking around his pickup truck, carrying a hardhat.

"Oh, it's just dad."

He smiled as he walked down the brick path from the driveway, "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing," she said, looking at her watch again.

From farther down the block a loud roaring reached them. The pavement began to rumble, and the sound began to grow louder until the truck turned the corner and started to drive towards the house.

The tires chirped as it stopped at the curb, the idling engine chugging obediently. A second later it shut off, the silence it left behind becoming unbearable.

"Who is it, John?"

He strained to see through the tinted windows, but could only shake his head, "I don't know."

The door opened and the driver walked grabbed something from the passenger seat. All they could do was watch as the stranger walked around the back.

"Yo." Mordecai said as he started down the sidewalk.

Farrah ran from the deck and intercepted him at the gate, "Mordecai!"

He smiled and returned the embrace, "Happy birthday, Farrah."

John watched from where he was standing, not bothering to follow.

"It's good to see you, honey."

"You too, mom." he said as he reached the middle of the walkway.

"Come in, dinner will be ready soon and you must be tired from the drive."

"Yeah, hurry up!" Farrah said as she ran up the steps following her mother.

Mordecai shifted the weight from his backpack and looked toward his dad.

"Hey, Mordecai."

He nodded, "Dad."

* * *

Alright, that's it for this one.

Now as for what I was saying in the beginning.

I have a story path for either way, MordXOC or MordXCanon. So, I figured I'd let you decide which you'd like to see. You can send a PM, leave a review, or answer the poll I'm gonna have on my profile.

Input through either way is appreciated. It'll be at least a week and a half before the next chapter because my AT! story needs updated, so that should be enough time to decide.

Also, I might start putting links to the lyrics I use in the openers in my profile, so you could check there if you wanna hear the actual song.

Alright, as always, thanks for reading!

"You stay classy, San Diego."


End file.
